This archive report was first published on 4 October 2021.
One on One With BrighterMonday CEO Emmanuel Mutuma ¶
Published on October 4, 2021
Emmanuel Mutuma, the CEO of BrighterMonday, one of East Africa's top online human resources and recruitment platforms, has 15 years of experience working in the creative, advertising, marketing, and information technology departments of different organizations.
As a graduate of digital marketing and social media from the London School of Business and Finance, Mutuma spoke to Enterprise about the future of work in Kenya.
The levels of unemployment in Kenya have worsened in recent times due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with 60 percent of the unemployed being young people aged between 18 and 35 years. The job market has become more competitive with global talent pools expanding, and remote work is being accepted as an option globally.
Most organizations are adopting workplace flexibility or working remotely, which has increased competition since not everyone is accustomed to the fact that they do not need to be physically present to deliver on roles and responsibilities. A company looking for a developer or digital marketer can now hire abroad, making it even more difficult for local talent pools that aren't matching skills expectations.
BrighterMonday, which is 15 years old in the market, has seen the job market change significantly in the last decade. The company has always been an online business and chose to challenge how recruitment was done, from traditional job applications using post office boxes to shortlisting piles of physical CVs for days or months.
Today, BrighterMonday uses technology, big data, analytics, and digital marketing to make it easier for employers to make the right decisions faster and hire the right people. For job seekers, it's easy to use, affordable, and convenient to apply for the right opportunities on their laptop or mobile device.
Employers who use BrighterMonday's platform enjoy an array of services, including an application tracking system (ATS) that helps them rapidly filter profiles that are relevant to their needs, supported by the company's algorithm and Artificial Intelligence (AI) engine.
This helps employers save time and manage their recruitment cycle with ease. The tool also helps employers communicate efficiently with applicants and make decisions using different data points within a CV, a profile, and an assessment.
Mutuma emphasized the importance of leveraging data in hiring decisions, saying, 'If a decision is not backed by data, it doesn't exist.' Employers are given the ability to rank profiles based on an algorithm and assessment score of candidates, and BrighterMonday presents behavioral and psychometric results to support the quality of talent.
For job seekers, the company evaluates skill gaps from profiles on its system and provides instant results on their level of performance. This transparency helps candidates choose to upskill to meet a better score that increases their chances of making it to the selection criteria.
According to Mutuma, the ideal candidate in today's job market has skills as the main factor in making some hiring decisions. There has been a global shift in the kind of skills required in the workplace, with employers looking for additional skillsets for the evolving business environment.
Some of the trending soft skills include adaptability and agility, emotional intelligence, openness to learning, creativity, and innovation, and critical thinking. For trending on-demand hard skills, digital and coding skills, data analytics, and technology skills have seen a significant increase in demand, especially after the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Mutuma also discussed the gig economy and how it relates to BrighterMonday's business. He emphasized that accelerated digitalization, coupled with expanded global talent pools and high levels of unemployment, necessitates the need for gig jobs. This means that organizations are also looking into cutting operational costs, which include recurring costs like salaries.
The need for gig jobs serves the purpose of accessing certain skills in a short period. If structured well, professionals can work in more than one company and reduce wastage and increase productivity. However, Mutuma noted that the legislator has a role to play in this too by passing the right laws to sustainably resolve the unemployment issue in the country by supporting the gig economy policy.
Finally, Mutuma spoke about BrighterMonday's Level Up campaign, which is targeted at professionals who aspire for more. The goal is to encourage them to get relevant content personalized to drive their personal success in four ways: getting a professional CV, getting noticed with a 100 percent complete profile, getting timely access to top jobs, and helping them get tailored career advice.
