By akademiotoelektronik, 29/11/2022

Strateos: the start-up that wants to facilitate the recruitment of engineers thanks to AI

The engineering profession is the most sought after and among the most difficult to recruit executive jobs in the world. Poor profile for many years, recruitment firms and consulting companies that hunt him relentlessly. To optimize processes and help companies recruit top profiles, Strateos has developed an AI-based solution. Alexandre Roy, its founder, sheds light on its use but also on the future of recruitment thanks to artificial intelligence.

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Who are you and what does Strateos offer?

Alexandre Roy: Hello! I am 35 years old, I am an engineer by training (EPF) and I am the founder & CEO of Strateos. Strateos is a tailor-made digital engineer recruitment solution that we created in 2017. We stand out from traditional players by an “Engineer Centric” approach (​​which places the engineer at the center of the process) and a significant investment in new technologies.

How did you come up with the idea of ​​creating this service?

A.R. : The starting point is certainly my passion for innovation and my desire to contribute to it in one way or another. This led me to an engineering consulting company and that's when I had a click. I was a business manager there and my role was to hire engineers and then “place them on assignment” with end customers. I made two observations during this experience: the first was that the processes had not changed for forty years: they were little digitized and even less automated. The second was that the relationship with the engineers was not always fair, a kind of one-way relationship. Strateos was thus born from the desire to make the recruitment of engineers simpler and more efficient by repositioning them at the heart of the process.

Why is it sometimes difficult to recruit engineers?

A.R. : You should know that in France and in Europe, the market has been suffering from a shortage of engineers for about forty years and that it will increase. We have to deal with the retirement of baby boomers who are not compensated by new arrivals, but also with the evolution of technologies which are constantly changing the skills to be mastered. Finally, it should be noted that the aggressive recruitment methods of ESNs accentuate this phenomenon.

Finally, the engineering profession is considered to be the most sought-after executive job and among the most difficult to recruit in the world according to CDEFI (Conference of Directors of French Engineering Schools).

What are – or have been – the main technological challenges of your application?

A.R. : The first challenge we encountered, beyond the framework of our application, is the reading and structuring of the data. Indeed, we collect more than 3,000 engineering CVs each month via our specialized job site, WebEngineering. The challenge is to read these CVs to render them in a uniform and accessible way. To achieve this we have developed a parser based on deep learning technologies.

The second challenge lies in the matching between an engineer and a project. To achieve the most accurate results, we implement various solutions including smart filters based on machine learning.

Do you think AI will become an essential tool in recruitment?

A.R. : I'm convinced ! “Enhanced recruitment” has already proven itself and saves considerable time. I think that AI can still greatly optimize the sourcing stage, which today represents 80% of the working time of “traditional” recruiters.

What are its limitations and how to overcome them?

A.R. : On the one hand, the analysis of a CV does not necessarily presume competence! On the other hand, AI has a tendency to discriminate that should not be ignored (when it compares a candidate being recruited with those already in office for example). The expertise of the recruiter therefore remains essential to identify and overcome its limits. Beyond that, I think that recruitment must remain deeply relational: technology is there to support and not to replace the human.

What's new for Strateos for the next few years?

A.R. : Continue to make the recruitment of engineers simpler and more efficient. We are thinking about creating an innovative media dedicated to engineers and rethinking our offer around a new concept. See you in the fall.

What are your ambitions for the coming years?

A.R. : Become the reference for the recruitment of engineers in France in the next 3 years and develop ourselves internationally to accelerate innovation and engineering projects all over the world…