How many of you just know you could get the job you want on Wall Street at your dream firm if you could just get your resumé in the right person's hands and get a one-on-one interview with him so you could convince him you're the man for the job? What would you give for an hour-long one-on-one lunch meeting with the one guy who could hire you on the spot?
This final installment in my Launchpad IGNITION series features a company that might just be able to arrange that meeting for you.
Connect for a Cause at its most basic is an online auction site much like eBay. Unlike eBay, however, they're not auctioning off old bicycles, comic books, or pirated software. Connect for a Cause only auctions one thing: face time. So if you're convinced that an hour alone with Lloyd Blankfein would land you that equity derivatives desk in London (I hear it's available), Connect for a Cause is where you need to go.
But why on Earth would Lloyd auction off an hour of his time? Because the money goes to the charity of his choice (and, let's face it, he's got some pretty serious PR issues to overcome these days). Here's a quick video that explains how it works:
Connect for a Cause from FatHappy Media on Vimeo.
Connect for a Cause founder Jason Nicosia knows how hard it can be to open doors. With a degree from LSU and a couple of run of the mill jobs, he admitted to me that his resumé doesn't exactly turn heads.
"But you get me in a room with someone", he continues, "and they're as good as closed. I'm pretty average on paper. Face to face it's a whole different story."
He's right. Jason is a salesman's salesman. He's bright, positive, and aggressive in a way that is charming but all business. And he knows his business.
The stroke of genius that stood out most to me was the way they recruit the executives and celebrities. The fact is they don't. Rather than cold calling Tim Cook (for example) and never getting through his various gatekeepers, Connect for a Cause would have Product RED (one of Apple's largest charities) get in touch with him and sign him up.
It's conceivable to think that Connect for a Cause could become a very real part of the recruiting landscape on Wall Street, especially on the buyside where shops are smaller and the head cheese has more to do with the daily operations of the firm. Obviously Connect for a Cause can't guarantee that anything will come out of a lunch meeting - that part's up to you. But it's an opportunity you wouldn't have otherwise had.
Connect for a Cause is going to forever change the traditional Cold Call/Gatekeeper sales method. It’s an innovative company with a conscience that will help job seekers, sales professionals, and networkers to make an in person connection with a VIP. Meeting the right people has always been the fastest way to get ahead, and now those connections can be made while fundraising for nonprofits all over the country at the same time.
The company is launching their beta on March 30. They've been self-funded to this point, but they're wrapping up a round of seed financing as we speak. They'll be looking to complete a Series A raise in the next year, and their revenue model enables the company to become profitable very quickly.
Connect for a Cause founder Jason Nicosia will be available to answer any questions you guys have in the comments.
Awesome idea... key question to the founder: - How do you feel about barriers to entry? How will you compete with imitators of your business model?
Privatising networking, awesome idea but damn this is going to piss off the liberals. Over in the UK we have a lot of people that hate the private education system. This is going to put a concrete block in between the haves and the havenots.
That's interesting, because I kinda see it as the exact opposite. This is going to enable a non-target kid with no OCR and no reasonable expectation of getting through the initial screening to at least present his case to someone who could make a difference. I actually see this as leveling the field a bit.
Side note: I would definitely take advantage of this to have lunch with someone awesome (Cal Ripken Jr. or something) but I can't see myself, or anyone I know, shelling out the kind of money I'm assuming this would require for the .01% chance that it results in a job. Just my thought but I could be wrong.
They've just commoditised networking. Uh oh!
While its a great idea I see a potential flaw.
The tenacity of non-target students will generally get them in front of someone one way or another but I can see the more 'well-off' in society abandon the cold calls/emails, the casual stalking, the bartender job at the pub that is beaming will financiers on a Friday, all to put a couple of hundred dollars together for a meeting.
I can see where the level playing field would come in but I guess ones financial standing will skew that playing field. Just imagine an apple fanatic only being able to bid $1000 max for a meeting with Tim Cook, while out in the suburbs of Chelsea, Mr Saatchi bidding $100000 for his son to have an audience with Cook.
yeah i don't see how the non-target kid can afford to bid for this service. Most non-target kids I know who are smart and motivated go to the school they go to because they couldn't afford anything better. with that said, i don't see many of them bidding top dollar for face time.
Do you realize that some of us non-target kids go to a non-target because we couldn't get into a target, not because we can't afford it?
And you also realise that there are some non-target kids who go to a non-target because they couldn't afford it?
Point being is that there are always people who will be able to afford to bid and others who wont. Wealth doesn't necessarily translate into an ivy if your academic credentials are questionable.
Where before the target and non-target thing seemed to be a divide, irrespective of wealth, what is being implied is that those that can afford vs those that can't adds another dimension.
Speak for yourself pal.
The non-target kid can afford to bid for the service since he's not spending $250K on a college degree
At first, I gritted my teeth at this idea. Paying for peoples' time. This strikes me as a hallmark of an utterly desperate job market.
But as a nerdy engineer who likes having the ability to fall back on his hard technical competencies when he doesn't feel like being a soft skills kinda guy, I really do like part of the concepts behind this. Want to be an aggressive punk? Fine. Pay my charity.
This is certainly a creative idea.
If anyone wants to meet me for coffee, feel free to make a generous donation to The Human Fund.
sure, that's probably true of a lot of non-targets. but i'd still argue that most non-targets that would be smart enough to land a banking job if it weren't for their shitty school and impressive enough to blow someone away in a one hour lunch would have been able to get into a decent school. and it really depends on how high these bids would get. i can see it easily becoming a money game, where target kids would still win.
No matter how you cut it, this is just another thing for people to point to and say 'see those 1%ers can do anything because they have money blah blah blah.'
Damn Eddie you on a roll...all this coming out from New Orleans wow
I just got an email from Jason. He's not blowing us off, he's actually competing in The Big Idea challenge all day today. He says he'll answer all the questions this evening.
I like the idea at face value but worry about the implications of someething like this. It seems like this is targeting desperate people who badly want to break into an industry and are wiling to spend tons of cash to meet with someone face-to-face. It's good that the money is going to charity, but wouldn't this penalize bright students and young professionals who just don't have the money? Meanwhile, a buffoon with rich parents can just blow cash to land "interview" with high-ranking finance professionals.
You don't like the idea of a product that is focused on people willing to spend a huge amount of money to do something that could or could not help them reach their career goals? So something like, lets say, a really overpriced trip to the 3rd world to 'volunteer for a week or two' in order to get into BSchool would be something you would frown upon?
Sound familiar?
Wow. Seriously? You just compared getting into a M7 business school-with its plethora of alums, name brand, and sick on-campus recruiting that brings top companies from virtually every industry to your doorstep-to having a one-hour lunch with a random guy who doesn't know you or give a flying fuck about you in hopes that it will "lead to something."
$250 donation to the Salvation Army of New York or USHGF.org = one hour meeting with IlliniProgrammer (dive bar, domestic beer only).
Had to look up USHGF = The Foundation for Hanggliding, and Paragliding, Inc. You always keep me on my toes, IP.
I agree that marketing shouldn't be a primary reason we do something, but I do think it is an OK way to justify the costs. It's not a deciding factor, but for those of us who are OCD about thrift, marketing takes away some of the sting.
The reason you go on a mission to Africa or learn skydiving or go winter camping in Yellowstone or the like is to grow as a person and learn more about what it means to be human. To step outside of a fairly ordinary 40 hour/week + exercise + tutor kids every weekend shell. If life is eat + sleep + work + exercise + routine volunteering, you're not quite living life to the fullest.
i think this service would be a lot more useful outside of finance. it'd be better used for people who are willing to pay big bucks to meet a celebrity, political figure, etc. commoditising networking would not only be disastrous, it wouldn't even work. the intention of whoever is bidding their time isn't going to be to recruit, and i doubt they're going to hand a job to some semi-impressive guy just because he's spent thousands of dollars for that meeting. and i think you'd have to be dumb to even bid just with the intention of getting a job out of it, it's statistically very unlikely.
with this said, the service is a cool idea for different uses. i can't even imagine how much rich high school kids would be willing to pay for lunch with a celebrity or something.
Exactly. I don't see this working for finance professionals. Great intentions, but i doubt it will work.
I'm sure Jason will speak to this, but it wasn't designed for Wall Street or finance professionals. I happened to see the application there so that's why I highlighted it for WSO.
Bottom line is, there's a million more people willing to bid on lunch with Drew Brees (with the proceeds going to the Brees Dream Foundation), but 99.9 percent of the population couldn't pick Lloyd Blankfein out of a lineup.
considering that folks would get on their knees for a "deposit" from a high flying wallstreeter, i think this business model is gold (check out the last few posts on this related thread http://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forums/is-it-wrong-for-a-student-to-slee…).
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