Founders Friday – Stefan van Tulder
This Friday, we are excited to feature Stefan van Tulder, founder of Talent Data Labs.
About Stefan
Prior to founding Talent Data Labs, Stefan was a consultant helping organisations to value-add through data and transition towards data-driven decision making. After years of experience, he found a glaring problem in psychometrics. The landscape excelled at helping hiring managers make sense of things, but often failed the real users (talent). This dissatisfaction sparked his entrepreneurial journey, as he got his hands dirty to build Talent Data Labs.
Stefan graduated with a double Master’s in International Management/Marketing from ESADE Business School in 2013. His other entrepreneurial pursuits include co-founding Nova, a HRtech company, in Brazil. Fun fact, Stefan is also a Google Alumni, where he worked as a business analyst in Dublin!
About Talent Data Labs
People spend a substantial amount of time on their careers. The team at Talent Data Labs (TDL) believes this time should be fulfilling and productive. Company culture, staff’s skills, and personality traits are all important factors in company success and employee satisfaction.
TDL’s team of scientists created and validated a sophisticated matching algorithm using machine learning and other scientific methods. Their programmatic approach to HR management generated a highly scalable application that can be accessed through APIs, dashboards and reports.
TDL uses this algorithmic approach to match people to companies and increase efficiency.
In one sentence, how would you summarise your journey so far
What has been the most satisfying aspect of entrepreneurship for you?
What do you feel is the essential quality a startup founder must have?
What advice would you have for someone contemplating leaving the corporate world to be an entrepreneur?
S: Leave your beliefs behind. Go build a team and an environment ready to tackle problems you do not even know exist yet.
It’s easy to sell your time and to do things clients (or employers) expect of you, but it’s very hard to sell a different approach (solution) to solving a problem that may not even be seen or appreciated.
How did you acquire your first customers?
What was the biggest challenge you faced in scaling your sales?
What aspects were the most important when building your team?
If you had to build your team again, what would you do differently?
What are the top 3 tips you have for investor pitching?
S:
1) Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder: if you want to attract the right investors for yourself, you need to be honest and sincere about what makes you tick and where you want to be in the next couple of years.
2) Investors prefer ideas that can potentially create incredible impact and potentially change the way we do things, globally. Have a long-term vision that can address those desires if everything goes according to plan.
3) The right investor fits into your culture rather than determines it. Use the same yardstick to interview your investor as you use to interview your team.
According to your investors, what sets you apart from other startups?
S: Vision. Unrelenting vision. Anyone can copy your math skills or data processing capacities, but nobody can copy your true shared beliefs, interests, and desires.
Any other words of wisdom that you would like to share?
S: On your journey, people will want you to be a lot of things that you aren’t or shouldn’t be. Keep your eyes on the ball and don’t compromise unless you absolutely have to. And don’t forget to have fun.
Stay tuned for next week's episode of Founders Friday
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