Employedornot

Inspiration

We were inspired by Tinder’s idea of making matches between people and making new connections that perhaps before wouldn’t have been made at all. We think there could be a lot of potential in our app for increasing employment based on this similar idea.

What it does

It’s basically an app that will make connecting to employers and employees easier. For employee user, you’d include a short description of yourself and other useful information and maybe a picture if you’re feeling bold. And basically the same for employers. This way both users could quickly see potential opportunities and start a chat when there’s a match, that is when you both happen to ‘like’ each other. We believe this more informal communication channel is easy for younger people to understand and could potentially accelerate hiring processes. Our app could also be used for small gigs and other non-corporate hiring.

How we built it

We started to build our app first with python and kivy, but later realized that this was perhaps not the way to go. We like python (who doesn’t?) and decided to build our program with it. Later on, we decided that an app for phones would be a better option. So then we started to work with Android Studio.

Challenges we ran into

All in all, this has been a pretty intense weekend. We ran into more challenges than we thought possible. One of the biggest challenges was managing our project and planning. We spent too much time on other ideas and methods and that of course takes a lot of energy as well. Our experience with Android Studio and java was pretty limited and so we had a lot of rough patches on the way. But I think we learned a lot from this experience!

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We are proud of making a working prototype, when at one point it seemed we didn’t have anything to show for our troubles. And we think there could be some serious potential in our idea, even if your app is very prototype-y. So all in all, we are pleased that we didn’t give up.

What we learned

We learned that a good plan is vital for a successful project and focusing resources on the right things is crucial. Of course, we learned a lot we didn’t know about java coding and using Android Studio, and general troubleshooting. Talking to other people at junction also taught us that having issues with our app was totally okay and expectable and that we shouldn’t despair.