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Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

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Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#51

Post by rajacombinator »

robocat wrote: post #11

> because we have aligned incentives [with our students] - we only make money if they do. If you sign up all students and do nothing further, you still get your 7%. That is not aligned. To align incentives you would have to align the students payments with how much you improved their outcomes - much harder to do of course. I think your model has the same risks as real estate commissions where the selling agent is hig…

Great point! Glad to see other skeptics already arrived.

I'd love to see a concept like this work but it is very difficult to truly align the incentives between recruiters and candidates or companies. Like you said it's just like real estate, a turnover game where the broker doesn't really care about optimal outcomes for the transacting parties.

That said this could still add a lot of value for students - I certainly had no clue about career paths when I was in school. So I hope they figure out a way to make it work for everyone.

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#52

Post by kevintxwu »

bojackstorkman wrote: post #50

I am curious as to how narrow your scope of industries/requirements will be in the future. I have a friend with a BA in Photography and a MA in Collaborative Design. She is very talented and intelligent, but has trouble explaining exactly what it is that she excels at. (I've known her for years and I still only get the gist of it. Think creative work mixed with formalized systems thinking.) Is this a possible custome…

Yup! Although we're not there yet, we believe the program is generalizable to every young professional who wants to work in the US, since the core insights themselves are not industry-specific.

Ideally the further we expand the more we're capable of supporting interdisciplinary job seekers like your friend. There's potentially something here where the more industries we cover, the more we know about everything in between those industries, and the more effective guidance we can provide to candidates who are stuck in between.

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#53

Post by evancharles »

I once visited a career office at a community college that I wanted to hire out of. What I saw was crushing - a small office run by a student volunteer with nothing but a few binders of reading materials.

I'm excited for private companies like this to help students who want to put in the work.

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#54

Post by bojackstorkman »

kevintxwu wrote: post #52
bojackstorkman wrote: post #50

I am curious as to how narrow your scope of industries/requirements will be in the future. I have a friend with a BA in Photography and a MA in Collaborative Design. She is very talented and intelligent, but has trouble explaining exactly what it is that she excels at. (I've known her for years and I still only get the gist of it. Think creative work mixed with formalized systems thinking.) Is this a possible custome…

Yup! Although we're not there yet, we believe the program is generalizable to every young professional who wants to work in the US, since the core insights themselves are not industry-specific. Ideally the further we expand the more we're capable of supporting interdisciplinary job seekers like your friend. There's potentially something here where the more industries we cover, the more we know about everything in bet…

Thanks! I'll pass that along.

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#55

Post by prawn »

evancharles wrote: post #53

I once visited a career office at a community college that I wanted to hire out of. What I saw was crushing - a small office run by a student volunteer with nothing but a few binders of reading materials. I'm excited for private companies like this to help students who want to put in the work.

During high school, I strongly remember what seemed like the entirety of career advice provided just before we selected the key subjects that would dictate which university/college courses we could apply for. There was a bland jobs guide book. We laughed at "crane chaser" and "cheese maker". Then we all stumbled forwards with no idea what we were doing.

Austen Allred had a tweet recently about how dangerous it is to get career advice purely from your parents. My parents are fantastically supportive, but I've ended up in a tech/software industry that they would've been oblivious to during their lives/careers. I could've definitely received far better and stronger advice during pivotal years. I made a misguided university choice, quit after six months, then stuffed around for a few years before starting the business that I still run 20 years later.

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#58

Post by jabv »

kevintxwu wrote: post #42
wohlergehen wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, a "progressive" pricing based on salary would be a good way to address this, e.g. >50k -> 1%, >80k -> 3%, >100k -> 5%, >120k -> 7%.

Percentages in and of themselves are progressive pricing! If we believe we can get the student a 100k+ job, we'll definitely be incentivized to help them get there instead of telling them to settle for a 50k job. The progressive^2 pricing model is interesting though. It's a little legally complex unfortunately so we have to look into it, but I also like the aspect of the idea where the less you make as a student, the…

Hmm, so would a flat tax rate actually be progressive? ;)

Re: Launch HN: Pathrise (YC W18) – Career accelerator for students, free until hired

#59

Post by jabv »

kevintxwu wrote: post #30
ISL wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Students are generally informed in writing about the impacts of student loans, but they sometimes regard loan providers as predatory once the loans come due. There is a chance here for both the student and Pathrise to benefit from working together, but the social interaction (and understanding that students sometimes make life-choices that they later regret) must be navigated with a deft touch. An up-front payment fo…

Yea, we definitely have to be sensitive about offering financing options directly to students. One of the ways we handle this now is we actually ask the students to consult their family before signing anything. We also allow the students to still drop out of the program at no liability within the first two weeks. The problem with upfront payment is that we are no longer held accountable by aligned incentives. The mos…

As an aside, I don't think "the most predatory thing" about student loans is the fixed cost regardless of profit. The same could be said of any business or real estate loan. The most predatory thing about student loans is that there's barely any rational qualification of the loan recipient.
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