Pedro Oliveira, Co-Founder Of Landing.Jobs- Connecting The Best Tech Professionals With The Right Tech Companies

Pedro Oliveira is the Co-Founder Of Landing.Jobs, a candidate-driven marketplace dedicated to matching the best tech professionals to the best companies all around Europe. Operating in Portugal, Germany, Spain, and the Netherlands, we believe that individuals must have ownership of their professional careers, having helped 1000+ people from all over the world to change their lives.

He is an HR-Tech innovator, and my career goal is: to build products that allow individuals to fully own their careers.

His career has had several tours of duty: developer, business analyst, researcher, manager, leader, and founder of several businesses.

He is a huge fan of science fiction content like Stargate SG-1, Star Trek, Dune. 

In an exclusive interview with AsiaTechDaily, Pedro says:

I believe truly knowing what respect, accountability, and strong-will are, are fundamental traits to grow and shape a powerful human being.

The best advice I’ve been given was “Done is better than perfect” by João Vasconcelos, founder, and CEO of Startup Lisboa.

On top of this advice, I’d advise people to be very self-aware of their motivations and to make sure they pick the right partners for their new journey.

Read on to know more about Pedro Oliveira and his journey.

Please tell me about your personal background and What motivated you to get started with your company?

Pedro Oliveira: I’m born and raised in Lisbon, a CS graduate from Instituto Superior Técnico, one of Europe’s best engineering universities.

I know a thing or two about technology, processes, and people. So far, my career has had several tours of duty: IT-business analyst, full-stack developer, researcher, project coordinator, engineering manager (of a remote tech team), and founder of another couple of businesses before bootstrapping Landing.Jobs.

Besides being a big fan of building digital products, I’m also a big fan of science fiction content like Stargate SG-1, Star Trek, Dune, among many others.

There are several motivating factors behind my decision to kick-off Landing.Jobs, some of them are: being independent and creating and growing digital products that have a worldwide impact on changing people’s careers for the better.

What is your current main product, and can you share any previous product pivot story to the current product?

Pedro Oliveira: Our current main product is our tech jobs marketplace that matchmakes tech professionals and companies using advanced evaluation technology.

We did, however, make an early pivot back in 2014 when we first launched a referral-based matching platform. Still, we quickly realized that we needed to focus on the candidate experience to make successful matches.

How much money have you raised in total so far? When was the recent funding round?

Pedro Oliveira: We started with a bootstrapping and sustainability mentality, which we still have until today. However, sometimes you must make calculated investments from hand-picked partners.

We raised a 750K€ seed round from LC Ventures and Portugal Ventures back in 2015, and we’ve recently closed a new investment round of 2M€ early this year.

What were the internal decision processes in determining when to begin fundraising, and what were the logistics for this? And how many investors have you met so far, and how did you meet these investors, and which channels worked best for you?

Pedro Oliveira: We have an ambitious business plan that requires strategic investment in order to grow our business, so we get closer to helping make our vision a reality: a world where tech professionals have ownership of their careers.

In terms of logistics, both processes took about 6-months to complete, and it’s practically a full-time job. You need to be conscious that when you’re fundraisin, as a founder, you’re not one hundred percent focused on your company.

We’ve met, and we’ve kept in touch with investors that have a fit with our vision. We have a CRM to manage those human relationships. Also, given the nature of our business, Landing.Jobs always comes in handy to help investors’ portfolio companies hire the right tech talent. The best channel is word of mouth and referrals. Also, investors keep knocking on our door to know more about Landing.Jobs.

What are the biggest challenges and obstacles that you have faced in the process of fundraising? If you had to start over, what would you do differently?

Pedro Oliveira: I guess it’s just that it’s a very time-consuming process. If we had to start over, we’d be a lot more demanding on those first rounds; we had more bargaining power than we thought we had. Also, I’d manage a bit better my time and focus in order to keep growing our business regardless of the investment process.

What are your milestones for the next round? And what are your goals for the future?

Pedro Oliveira: We’ve got a roadmap and a “north star” to follow. We don’t necessarily have to go for a new round unless we want to. Right now, that’s the road ahead, but we’re also close to sustainability as a business, so we are independent and free to make our own decisions. Our current investors are aligned with this vision and way of operating; our board doesn’t believe in “burning cash” to grow.

How have you attracted users, and with what strategy have you grown your company from the start to now?

Pedro Oliveira: The best talent acquisition strategy is word of mouth. This is quite hard to hit, though, but if you’re doing a good job, and in our case, it’s matching people and companies to one another then, word of mouth comes naturally. Besides that, we use a combination of content, paid marketing (ads and job aggregators), mail, and social.

Which has been the best marketing software tool for the growth of your startup, and why?

Pedro Oliveira: I can’t pick the right one, really, and it’s a combination of marketing tools plus internal tooling developed by us. And this is a dynamic duo.

What do most startups get wrong about marketing in general?

Pedro Oliveira: Making sure those first early adopters become heavy ambassadors and feeding back their feedback into their products.

How do you plan to expand globally?

Pedro Oliveira: We have our own expansion formula, which is a combination of factors, including adaption to the local market rules. We’re already operating in multiple countries, and our talent user base is based all over the world.

What are the most common mistakes companies make with global expansion?

Pedro Oliveira: It might be expanding too fast, too soon. Geographical expansion is expensive and takes time – each region has its own specs, and you must understand them, especially in Europe with its many different micro-cultures, sometimes even within one country.

How do you handle this COVID-19 outbreak situation for your company’s survival in the future?

Pedro Oliveira: We spend 30% of our time fixing and improving our internal processes and 70% looking outwards to help our clients find new creative ways to hit their talent acquisition targets, and while doing this, we’ve also found new lines of revenue in segments like remote working.

What are the most common mistakes founders make when they start a company?

Pedro Oliveira: The biggest mistake is to pick the wrong cofounder for your new company. It’s fundamental to make sure there’s founder alignment at the values level; when there’s a lack of alignment, things tend to go badly at some point in the startup’s life.

I believe there are a couple of other relevant mistakes I see founders making.

It is hiring the wrong people. I believe leaders have little idea how damaging this can be, the cost of hiring and letting go of someone is enormous. When you’re starting, this is something you should try to avoid. The caveat is that you know you’re going to make mistakes, so it’s a bit of a good idea to start becoming proficient at hiring from day zero.

The second thing is lack of focus; when you’re starting, everything is a greenfield, and that’s a great feeling, but the potential for unfocus is huge. Be mindful of this.

What’s the best advice you’ve ever received? And What advice do you have for someone who is interested in doing similar things like yours or in a similar direction?

Pedro Oliveira: The best advice I’ve been given was “Done is better than perfect” by João Vasconcelos, founder, and CEO of Startup Lisboa.

On top of this advice, I’d advise people to be very self-aware of their motivations and to make sure they pick the right partners for their new journey.

What are the top-three books or movies (TV series) that changed your life and why?

Pedro Oliveira:

Both “Blindness,” by Saramago, and “Animal Farm” and “Nineteen Eighty-Four,” by Orwell, actively contributed to shaping my political POV.

How do you keep yourself motivated every day?

Pedro Oliveira: Physical exercise to build headspace for any work challenge that is thrown at me, and I try to have a clear priority list in my head and usually written down on a piece of paper too.

What are the top three life lessons that you want your (future) sons and daughters to know?

Pedro Oliveira: I believe truly knowing what respect, accountability, and strong-will are, are fundamental traits to grow and shape a powerful human being.

What would you like to be remembered for?

Pedro Oliveira: I would like to be remembered as a just and good friend, an individual who could be trusted and an innovator at heart.

You can follow Pedro Oliveira here.

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