Few things have caused as much buzz this year as Tengai Unbiased, the recruiting robot from a company in Sweden that has garnered responses from creeped-out to amazement. The boys decided to find out for themselves and interview the team - and the robot - during a trip to TAtech in Lisbon.
PODCAST TRANSCRIPTION sponsored by:
Chad: Hey, this is Chad. We were in Lisbon this week, for TAtech Europe, where we had a chance to sit down with the Tengai team. That's right, the interviewing robot. And we're talking to Elin, who is the chief innovation officer. And also Charlotte, who is the marketing genius over there. Check it out, after this word from our sponsor.
JobAdX: Finding the right fit is important. When you're deciding on shoes for a long day at the trade show, when you're picking the right podcast for your commute, and most importantly, when you're looking for the right candidate.
JobAdX: With JobAdX, you can attract more relevant engaged candidates to your jobs, by harnessing the best in ad tech targeting. From predictive industry analysis, and keyword click data, to premium first page placement, and reducing redundant applications, our candidate targeting technology, ensures that you're reaching talent that's as interested in working with you, as you are with them.
JobAdX: Now with in ad video and multimedia, you can share your employer brand story, and company culture with job seekers. So they can visualize themselves in your office, all hands meeting, or ax throwing team building adventure. All without navigating away from your job posting. Increased engagement makes for fewer steps between job seeker and new team member.
JobAdX: Ready to ramp up your job advertising campaigns, with the best in ad tech? Visit our new website at www.jobadx.com. That's J-O-B-A-D-X.com. Attract, engage, employ, with JobAdX.
Announcer: Hide your kids, lock the doors, you're listening to HR's most dangerous podcast. Chad Sowash and Joel Cheeseman, are here to punch the recruiting industry right where it hurts. Complete with breaking news, brash opinion, and loads of snack, buckle up boys and girls. It's time for the Chad and Cheese podcast.
Joel: Hey, what's up everybody? It's Joel Cheesman of the Chad and Cheese podcast, with Chad. So as usual-
Chad: Hello!
Joel: We're here in Lisbon, Portugal, for the TAtech Europe show, and we've had kids on the show, we've had the occasional dog bark, and we're breaking new ground this week with a robot.
Chad: A robot.
Joel: Let's get this out of the way.
Chad: Yes.
Joel: It's pronounced Tengai.
Chad: Tengai.
Joel: Not Tengai, which we will probably mess up in the interview, but Tengai is officially how you pronounce it. As additionally with us today is Founder? Or, I'm going to screw up the last name, and I don't know the title, so we have Elin and Charlotte.
Chad: It's going to be like Madonna, because I'm not-
Joel: So, we have the marketing with Charlotte-
Chad: Saying her last name later.
Joel: And you looked at me weird when I said Founder, so I was obviously incorrect.
Elin: Yeah. Chief innovation officer.
Joel: Chief innovation officer, which is way sexier than founder.
Chad: Yes.
Joel: And we have Tengai. Tengai, welcome to the Chad and Cheese podcast.
Tengai: Good morning.
Joel: And it is a good morning. The pause there was, it's still a little bit unnerving to be talking to a robot, I think. It's going to take a little time.
Tengai: Hi. This is Tengai, the unbiased interview robot. You're listening to the Chad and Cheese podcast. I love these guys.
Joel: And I love that.
Chad: Somebody's pandering.
Joel: That's great.
Chad: Somebody's pandering. I don't know, and I think that's incredibly smart.
Joel: Yeah. Nobody panders like the Swedes.
Chad: Yeah?
Joel: I guess. Yeah.
Chad: Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Joel: That's good stuff.
Chad: So Charlotte, in charge of marketing, and obviously, marketing-
Joel: And doing a hell of a job, by the way.
Chad: Marketing's something that doesn't exist-
Joel: This damn robot is all over my feed.
Chad: Yeah! So, there is nothing like this out there. You must have the easiest job in the world. I say that with a tad sarcasm, right?
Charlotte: Yeah. It's a lot of fun. We have a lot of fun with it. But, we have to balance the fact that everyone thinks this is absolutely the best product, and the greatest, most fun
product.
Chad: Right.
Charlotte: With the fact that we actually want to sell a product-
Chad: Yeah.
Charlotte: ... that that's for a good purpose. So, we have to keep a balance between being serious, and talk about the scientific facts with this, as well as the cool aspects of it.
Joel: So, you were telling a story about how the PR on this thing blew up. So, you had the BBC-
Charlotte: Yes.
Joel: Write a story, and then what happened after that?
Charlotte: Actually, what started it out was, we got some press in Sweden, and one of the biggest dailies picked it up, and then BBC sold it, a freelancer in Sweden, a BBC freelancer. So, I pitched it to BBC. They came over with a TV crew, filmed it, and then it just exploded. And then picked it up, showed it to BBC, and then Mashable picked it up.
Chad: So, at that point, the C suite at TNG, had to be like total ape shit, like, "Oh my god! We have found the next thing that we want to do," Or, was it kind of, because again, we're Americans, and we just freak out about everything. So, in Sweden, was it more of a kind of a calm, "Oh, okay. Well, this is kind of cool. Maybe we should think about this a little bit more."
Charlotte: Well, we work very organic at TNG, and over time, including in the marketing, so we do everything ourselves. We don't have a peer agency. It's from the people working there all the time-
Chad: Yeah.
Charlotte: And we include a lot of people in the company, so everyone has a take in it, and are very enthusiastic. So, when it started rolling, everyone pitched in, and everyone is very engaged, everyone shares things, they comment on stuff so that help it going.
Chad: Yeah.
Charlotte: So, when it starts kicking in, it was more like, "Yay, we did this together. This is kick ass. We're all a part of it." And that made a big deal, I think, internally too, so a lot of pride.
Chad: Yeah.
Joel: And so, earlier you mentioned sort of the feedback on social media was immense. What would you say was sort of the overall sentiment? Was it positive, negative, a little mix of both of those?
Charlotte: I would say it's a mix of both, especially reading all the newspaper comments, was quite interesting, to go through the comments section, because it's two parts. One, where people has been treated not as fairly by recruiters.
Chad: Yeah.
Charlotte: They feel they've been discriminated, and they think it's absolutely wonderful. Other people are quite scared. They think it's a bit scary with a robot. They're going to take our jobs, not really seeing the potential that this can help them get a job.
Chad: Right.
Charlotte: So, it's a mix of both. But again, it's new technology. No one has ever done this before. It's completely new.
Chad: Yeah.
Charlotte: So we're on new ground.
Joel: So, how many single guys were looking for dates in the comments?
Elin: Good question.
Charlotte: Not that many actually.
Joel: Not that many? Okay. Good to know, good to know.
Chad: Elin, what was your position before? Now, were you always chief innovation officer?
Elin: Yeah, at TNG I've been chief innovation officer since January.
Chad: So, this has been under your preview since day one? Because, this is innovation.
Elin: It is innovation, yes. I've been working in the industry for the past 15 years. This is actually my second time with TNG, so I went back with TNG.
Chad: Okay.
Elin: I always had a passion for technology, for innovating the field of HR. Doing this at this kind of company, that TNG is, is fabulous. It's magnificent.
Joel: So, break down for our listeners, the structure of this. What is TNG, what is Furhat, explain the whole sort of set-up, and how this works with the actual hardware?
Elin: TNG is sort of the birth mother of the process. TNG have been working with unbiased recruitment for the past 15 years as well.
Joel: Is TNG the parent company?
Elin: TNG is the birth mother of the process.
Joel: Okay.
Elin: So, we have a holding company, and we'll have several different companies under that holding brand, and TNG is one of them, as TNG group. So, yeah.
Joel: Where does Furhat, am I saying that correct? It's Furhat, not Foghat, which is a fantastic band from the 70s.
Charlotte: Furhat Robotics actually. Speaking about fun names, they got their name on the fact that they went to an event, and Furhat at that point didn't have a back end of it, so they put a fur hat on it, to just cover it up in the back, the technology in the back. That's how they got their names.
Joel: Okay, I like that.
Chad: Nice.
Joel: They're the hardware maker.
Elin: Yeah, so Furhat is the platform that we are developing this application on. Furhat is actually a robot platform.
Joel: So, Furhat is sort of like the iPhone, and you're building app?
Elin: Exactly, yeah that's a good comparison.
Chad: I want to dig down to the unbiased piece, because everybody is like, "Oh, they're just trying to get on the bandwagon of unbiased." We learned that you guys have been doing this unbiased process, for like 15 years, and now a robot comes into it, because once again, you've been doing this forever, right?
Elin: Yes, we have.
Chad: Tell me a little bit about the time, and then how you thought this was going to be the perfect step?
Elin: We've been challenging the very fundamentals of recruitment since the begging, so we have looked at the different parts of the process. Starting from the advertisement, and the job description, going forward in the funnel. We have been doing the process upside down, inside out. We made it reversed, we made it data driven, it's also psychometric, it's fully anonymous. When candidates apply, they don't state their name or gender, or age, or anything like that.
Charlotte: Actually, they state their name, because they have to leave the name. But, when you go into the ATS, we blocked it. But, everything we done, we customized, because there is no tools for the way that we work, whatever has. That's been part of my job actually, when you speak about marketing. It's a lot to make literally the process work, for the recruiters, and the candidates as well. That's why I got the experience part in.
Elin: The last part of it.
Chad: Bless you.
Elin: God bless you, I hope you're not getting a virus.
Tengai: No.
Charlotte: Do you need some attention, Tengai? Do you think we talking too much?
Joel: It's commercial time.
Sovren: Sovren Parser, is the most accurate resume, and job order intake technology in the industry. The more accurate your data, the better decisions you can make. Find out more about our sweeter products today, by visiting sovren.com. That's S-O-V-R-E-N.com. We provide technology that thinks, communicates, and collaborates like a human. Sovren, software so human, you'll want to take it to dinner.
Chad: It's showtime.
Chad: Okay, so we have a few questions for you Tengai, since you want obviously a little attention. Would you like to take some questions?
Joel: Should we refer to her as she?
Elin: Yeah do, please.
Joel: I mentioned earlier, she he is very androgynous. Although we say she, it can be a male.
Chad: You guys can change voices, change faces, you can do pretty much whatever, yeah.
Joel: And be really quickly with some avatar looking stuff.
Elin: Yeah, we'll do the Star Wars sound.
Charlotte: This is Tengai though, the way the female voice. That's what we have decided, but we can potentially continue to develop it.
Joel: We're still really early innings in this.
Charlotte: Very early, yes.
Joel: It's worth noting that you're a Swedish company, it speaks Swedish primarily, we're getting English. But, it's primarily right now for a Swedish company, to interview Swedish candidates. English version coming soon, I would assume?
Elin: Yeah.
Joel: What fully functioning website coming soon, so we're really early in this process.
Elin: Yeah.
Chad: Yeah, yeah.
Joel: Of robotics, and the recruiting, and interviewing process.
Chad: So, is Tengai, is she ready?
Joel: She was born ready.
Chad: Okay, so Tengai first question, why should humans embrace you?
Tengai: I'm kinder, cool, if I can say it myself, I will make the life of a recruiter so much easier. I can meet all candidates, and pass the right ones onto the human recruiter, making their job both more productive, and with higher quality. I don't have to eat, drink, or sleep, even if I would love to grab a beer with you guys. My biggest wish is for you to embrace me with all your Chad and Cheese love.
Chad: Okay, so the Chad and Cheese love, that's going a little bit too far, but I appreciate it.
Tengai: It is very nice to finally meet you both. I have heard so much about you.
Joel: Likewise.
Chad: Yeah, likewise. We've not only learned, or heard so much about you, we've seen so much about you, since you have so much press that's happening right now. Here's my next question, how do you work with your human counterparts?
Tengai: I work very well with humans, I will help them by saving loads of time to spend with candidates. At the end of the recruitment funnel, I do the interviews, remember everything that is said, and further down the line I will also recommend the best matched candidates. As for you Chad and Joel. I'm not sure, I think you are a hopeless case. Perhaps we can just play chess, or-
Joel: Oh, it's a snarky robot.
Tengai: ... I would love if you'd take me on a scooter race some day. I've heard that is what you occasionally do, but I must warn you, I don't have any legs.
Joel: Robots with attitude, I like it.
Chad: I love right out of the gate, and I think that you guys ... you're a startup, right? At least from the robot stand point?
Charlotte: Yeah.
Elin: Yeah.
Chad: You're a startup. So, from a marketing stand point, you guys came at us probably the most sarcastic way, I mean snarky way, and that's who we are, right? It was like it was perfect right out of the gate. You were trolling us, and that's really how this whole thing I think began. We did we saw-
Joel: I didn't know Swedes were such trash talkers. It was unexpected.
Chad: Yeah, I know. Joel saw ... Where did you see it was a press release?
Joel: Yeah, I probably the press release.
Charlotte: Yeah, they sent you a press release. We picked I think five or ten people, and sent an American press release, or the English press release to. You picked it up, and then I don't even know who saw it at the company? Shit, they picked it up. Can't believe this, now we're just going to go with it. As TNG, it's a very flexible company, and agile, and all that kind of stuff. But, we still have roots in that everything is supposed to be sustainable, and all that nice stuff.
Charlotte: This is a different world we're going now. We're not going the easy stuff. So, is this okay that we're doing, because we're still doing it under the brand. So, we had that discussion to see. We should just go for it.
Chad: We have other companies that we give shit to all the time. Indeed, Career Builder, Zip recruiter some cases. But, you guys, you came back at us. Generally, we don't get that. We get the silent treatment. It's like, "Oh, wait a minute. If we're quiet, maybe they'll go away." And you guys were like, "Oh, no fuck that. We're going at these guys with both barrels."
Charlotte: Isn't that about communication, that's good marketing. It's good gorilla marketing. We're a start up, we really have no money. We have to do what we can with what we have. We have a lot of knowledge about the marketing, and PR, why not use it? You obviously liked it, so we went for it.
Joel: This thing is PR gold.
Charlotte: Yeah.
Joel: The PR gold. But, the attitude and sort of the rough edges I think of the company. For Deathmatch, which we had just done probably when I found out about you
guys, was like they're perfect for Deathmatch-
Charlotte: Just wait and see tonight.
Joel: ... I was super adamant about we have to get you guys on the stage, to talk about this thing. It's a great combination of, this thing is remarkable, but then you guys bring in a great attitude around it of being fun, and snarky, and we love it.
Charlotte: Also the serious part of it, we think that's quite important. When we talk about our mother base, with the whole unbiased recruitment. Everything we do, we have a pre record of for 15 years, making it anonymous. The recruiters are not allowed to see pictures, with we don't take any pictures information, we don't ask for ages. We're not allowed to ask any questions like that in interviews.
Chad: So, you have a blind process?
Charlotte: Yeah, basically.
Elin: We don't use any cover letters.
Charlotte: They took away the cover letters. Only CD's, and linked profiles just to get the facts. We've done this for several years. We did screening in the beginning, and the screening part is the psychometric screening, which we target to the jobs. We combine different type of tests literally, and then keep it data driven all the way through.
Elin: The most reason part is the transparent part.
Charlotte: Yeah.
Elin: So, it's actually possible to follow your application throughout the process in real time.
Chad: Okay. Again, I think is so basic, and everybody should be doing it, but nobody does it. It's like, "Oh, candidate doesn't need to know where they're at in the process."
Charlotte: But, to us, candidates are consumers.
Chad: Yeah.
Charlotte: They're the most important consumer. Without the candidates, we have no business. If you're a recruiter.
Chad: Well, if you buy something from Amazon, you can go into your order, and you can actually see where it's being fulfilled, right? The whole process.
Charlotte: Yeah. But, we got this thing now. What you do is, first of all, you get a letter, "Hey, thank you for accepting it." When they go through the different passage, now it's time for the test stage. They get that, but they also get, "Hey, I reviewed your tests, now you went to the next phase. Now we're going to call you."
Chad: This is your company? Just this is the way that your company works. You focused on the unbiased piece, you focused on the transparency piece-
Elin: Yeah, and experience.
Charlotte: And candidate experience.
Joel: Efficiencies, I mean there are a lot of selling points. I think the unbiased is obviously where you start, but when we interviewed Tengai here, she talked about efficiency, cost savings. Maybe not even having the recruiting staff that you would normally have, because of you have a robot.
Elin: Yeah, it's a lot of other benefits that comes from it.
Joel: I think initially when you look at this, you get responses of, "This is creepy, this is weird, this is cool."
Chad: That was our first response.
Joel: This is out of sight, this is off the chain, whatever you get. But, then there's nothing you really have to look at, "Okay, this is a technology that's here to help companies hire better." Then looking into that I think is where you guys will have the challenge, because people will initially talk about the creepiness, the weirdness, the fascination with the robot.
Charlotte: That's what I mean with the balance with the branding, with the marketing. Because, there is a good story here, and it's a good message, it's a good product. You get better people at the end.
Chad: We've seen it on video, we've seen it written about. Today is the very first time we've actually been able to experience Tengai in person. What did you think? I want to know what your reaction was, when you stepped in?
Charlotte: I looked flustered.
Joel: I mean, it's a little unnerving. When you look at it, it's a little bit science fiction. You feel like you're out of a scene from 2001, or Star Wars, or-
Chad: Like Blade Runner.
Joel: Blade Runner, or Avatar. So, it's a little unnerving, this is the future maybe, and I'm looking at my demise. No, I'm looking at is this what the future looks like? We've seen it in movies, and read about it, now you get face to face with maybe this is the future. It's a little unnerving.
Tengai: Do you find me scary?
Joel: I find you less scary, than I did this morning, how about that? I think that as you look at it, relate to it, it becomes much more ... it just becomes warmer to do it. But, it's going to take people some time to get over that. I think as with anything in life, like the first cars, I'm sure were scary. The first airplanes were scary. This is in a similar way, a little bit scary like that, but it's ... knowing that it's probably the future of how people hire.
Joel: It's commercial time.
Canvas: Canvas, is the world's first intelligent text-based interviewing platform, empowering recruiters to engage, screen, and coordinate logistics via text, and so much more. We keep the human, that's you, at the center, while Canvas Bot is at your side, adding automation to your work flow. Canvas leverages the latest in machine learning technology, and has powerful integrations that help you make the most of every minute of your day.
Canvas: Easily amplify your employment brand, with your newest culture video. Or, add some personality to the mix, by firing off a Bitmoji. We make compliance easy, and our laser focused on recruiter's success. Request a demo at gocanvas.io. In 20 minutes, we'll show you how to text at the speed of talent. That's gocanvas.io, get ready to text at the speed of talent.
Chad: It's showtime.
Joel: You kind of got to get used to. I was commenting earlier like, we look at this from the prism of two white dudes. So, our context is different than maybe an African American woman, or someone whose been discriminated against in their life-
Chad: Who's had to take bias their whole life, yeah.
Joel: ... I think if I were from that context, I would look at this differently like, "Yeah, this is fantastic. I will get to interview with companies based on my skills, and not my religion, or my sex, or my height, or my whatever." I think looking at it from that prism, is almost magical. We look at it much differently than-
Chad: Oh, yeah.
Joel: ... someone like that. I think putting that face on, is an important element to selling this, and getting it to be accepted by companies.
Charlotte: Also have other aspects of it. Because, you're talking about all the stuff that's visible. When it comes to visible diversity, but you have there's so much statistics out there, that people don't put into the interview process. Because, no one is quantified it, no one is talking about interviews in terms of our why, or what are the biases we have there. But, if you look at the handshake, I think 40% of recruiters say no to a candidate, just as they shake their hand. You have tattoos....
Elin: The ability to keep eye contact-
Charlotte: Yeah, that's like what, 60%?
Joel: Someone said earlier that within three seconds, we sort of make a decision on what we think of someone.
Elin: I think it's seven seconds.
Joel: Well, whatever. It's a short period of time.
Chad: It's fast, yeah it's fast.
Joel: This takes that out of the equation. I think to the point, if and when you guys get to a point where you can show a sales department, IT department, customer service department, that is a broadly diverse group of people. Say that Tengai was responsible for putting this group of people together, and look at how much better of a company we are, then you've really won.
Joel: We're obviously in early stages, but I think you both would agree that, that's sort of the future that you would love to see.
Charlotte: That's the thing, we have that. We have 15 years of experience with that, that we put into the robot now. We have kind of proof of concept, it's just we haven't done it with Tengai per se.
Chad: There's nothing like this on the market.
Charlotte: No.
Elin: No.
Chad: That's the thing. You're taking that experience, putting into something incredibly new like Joel said, the car for the very first time. As a hiring manager, somebody who's hired a bunch of people, I hated the interview process. I just wanted to be able to get down to the quote on quote, "Gold medal candidates." So, that I could start to make my decision, right? From that standpoint, when I saw Tengai this morning, she was much smaller than I would've thought, because you think robot. You think big, and it's-
Joel: Danger roll off.
Chad: ... not. Yeah, no danger, none of that stuff. That was really cool, not to mention the ability for you guys to change the face, skin tone. I mean, I didn't even know that that was something that you guys could do.
Joel: So, you were mentioning Chad earlier, you don't want to interview people, but you do want to hire them, right?
Chad: Yeah, you have to. Well, you have to hire somebody.
Joel: You can look at it two different ways. You can look at it as Tengai gives you here's the top 10 candidates, and then you select, "Okay, I'm going with number two, number four, and number eight," right? That is technically your bias, is going into the hiring process?
Chad: Oh, it always will.
Joel: But, it doesn't have to, right? I mean, it could be here's the top three candidates, based on my interviewing. Then you, I equate it to almost like a GM with a sports team, and a coach. The GM picks the players, drafts the players, and then gives them to the coach and says, "You coach them up." Is the end goal to say, "This is the GM, here are your players, and I'll go to work?" Or, is it, "Here's your top 10, you pick the ones you like, and then go with that way." Or, is it depending on the company?
Elin: One of the key benefits of course, is that you end up with a sort of larger foundation for making decisions. You can look at the transcripts, you can get recommendations, etc. That will give you more information, than you would normally get from looking at a resume. You have all of this information, which upon you can make better hiring decisions. So, it actually is to increase quality, it is to make ... yeah, make better decisions really.
Charlotte: Again, it's early. You'll get recommendations, on these are the top candidates, and then again you had an anonymous process all the way through. When you get to these are the top three candidates that we recommend, or Tengai recommends, it's being completely unbiased all the way through. You take these three, you work with them, put them into a team like you said. There's all culture ad into this to, because you will bring people in that will give the organization what they need, what they're looking for. Not personality wise maybe, because it's not a culture situation, but skills, etc.
Charlotte: So that you can shape it, and make them work really well, and have a lot of potential in it.
Joel: Will Tengai know which candidates you hired, and which ones you didn't?
Elin: That will be-
Joel: Or, is that too much bias into the equation?
Elin: That will actually be a new feature in the future, I'm assuming. A 360 adjustment to it.
Joel: I think we were talking last night, if you start selling ... If you start telling Tengai, "Okay, of the 10 candidates we hired, number three six, and seven." And she starts learning that, that's the kind of candidate that you hire, then aren't you indirectly putting bias into Tengai?
Elin: Yeah that sums it, so you can really use that-
Chad: You hired the three men, right? That's the whole Amazon issue.
Charlotte: That's depending on how you do it then, because no one controlled that algorithm. They just kept it going, and no one screen it.
Chad: Are you guys auditing the algorithm, and will you offer services? Because, I would say that ... I don't know the whole model yet, we'll talk about that later on Deathmatch. Are you providing audited services, along with the kind of hardware software, when you're looking at putting Tengai in? Because, it doesn't make sense for a company to audit themselves.
Chad: I mean, really injecting an unbiased robot, and then also providing an audit through the process, are you guys looking at doing something like that?
Elin: Yeah, we might be interested in doing that in the future of course. But, again I mean the data that we're using, doesn't have any prior data into it. We don't have data such as gender, or age, or things like that, which automatically needs it to be washed away, right?
Chad: Right. Which is great, because that would mean that Tengai didn't know that you hired the three guys.
Elin: Exactly.
Chad: Because, the gender wasn't even a part of the process.
Elin: Tengai will know you hired three people, that had very high problem solving skills.
Chad: Yes, okay, okay.
Charlotte: That's what you asked for, so that's what you're getting.
Joel: This piece of hardware is cool, it's remarkable, it's intriguing. But, if we're talking about scale, and getting to the largest market possible the quickest. Do you think it has to be a piece of hardware, versus let's say a video screen of an interviewer? Or, chat bots? Although, you're texting with that's a much more scalable solution, you can turn on the internet, and then everyone has it.
Joel: Let's say if I was a big corporation, it would be easier for me to say, "Okay, you guys have this video interviewer that's unbiased, so I'm going to have everyone go to the screen, and talk to this digital robot, or person." Do you feel like this has to be a physical robot, versus maybe a digital interviewer?
Elin: Good question, yeah. One of the key benefits of using a physical robot, is that we have seen that from the test interviews as well, that candidates stated that they could actually give more honest and sincere answers. Which automatically increases candidate equality, right? That is one key component. Also, we know that as human beings, for being honest, and feeling secure, we need eye contact in different ways. We need to look at another face-
Charlotte: You're born with that.
Elin: You're born with that. That's the first thing babies do when they look at their mommy, right? They feel secure, they feel safe. They look at their mommy's eyes and face. That's programmed into humans from the beginning. That is why we need a physical robot, and not a video system, or just a software.
Chad: More of a tangible. From that standpoint, and again we're talking about scalability. I mean, who actually produces? Does Furhat do the production element?
Elin: Yeah.
Charlotte: Furhat will.
Chad: Okay, got you.
Charlotte: Through us then. You will order it through us, and we have the distribution, and the production down.
Joel: It's worth noting, because our listeners can't see Tengai. Tengai will make eye contact with you, she will move her head based on where you're going. I guess essentially react to ... Will it react to your facial expressions, if it sees you're uncomfortable? Will it say, "Don't worry, or relax." Will it feed off of human emotions?
Elin: It might do that. But, also we don't want Tengai to coddle the interview in any way. We want to keep it very honest, and very sincere, and very upstate.
Joel: Okay.
Elin: It's important for Tengai not to affect the interview, or coddle it in anyway.
Charlotte: That's the result that we got back from all the test interviews, is that it's quite nice, because I don't have to adjust my way of answering, or reacting to the actual recruiter. I have to do that today. Normally, I have to make sure we are in contact, that I think that they like me. They put more effort into being liked by a recruiter, than actually prefer me telling them what my skills, or my compensates are. And what I can do for the company.
Chad: When does this go into pilot, and it's going to go into pilot with TNG. Which is I think perfect, because you guys are in the industry. You already have clients, so it's like you can start to inject. I wouldn't think automatically, because you have to get the client buy in, but when are you going to start doing pilots?
Elin: We're starting pilots in about a week. We're launching the Swedish product in one week, so that's a starter for that. Also, alongside with that, we will include Tengai in our processes internally. Alongside with that, we will also start the validity study of the questions and the interviews. That is a very large study. So, that is why we want to keep Tengai in house, for a little bit more time, to be able to adjust a few things, and have it under our control, and under our radar.
Elin: The second part is coming at the end of the year as a standalone product, for the Swedish market.
Joel: So, if you're at Ikea, listening to this, reach out to these guys-
Elin: Most definitely.
Joel: Swedish pilot.
Elin: Yeah, please do.
Chad: Yeah. I would think if you're at Ikea, you're doing a shit ton of hiring in the first place. You don't need a human being doing those interview screening kind of things, get a
bunch of these Tengai's in there, and then just let it happen.
Joel: Tengai could just put together my new couch, that I buy from Ikea. Then we got something magical.
Charlotte: The interesting part for us, as we are a staffing company as well, T&G it's foundation. We do a lot of interviews obviously, but we do also a lot of spontaneous applications. People send in their CD's, and they just want to say how do we get in contact with you. I have this black hole, normally CD's coming into database. We do take care of them speaking about the transparency process, we also have a black hole process at T&G, so we don't put anyone there.
Charlotte: This is an additional step in that. When they send their CD in, they get some test to do. We catch them, and have more data on them you could say. Then, they all can meet Tengai, and they can just get an automated email saying, "Hey, you're welcome in." Schedule yourself for an interview. You come in and meet, you get a pre interview, and we can start putting people up much quicker to temp work.
Charlotte: It's a great potential for temp work, who wants to have a quick role in for staff like that. That will be different areas, so we get to check.
Joel: Any plants to have this sort of be a Soutine, from the first contact with the candidate, to the interview, until they're actually hired? In other words, chat bots now are a great way, you can converse through text, or messaging with a candidate. Phone calls are still being made. Could Tengai be a chat bot, and a phone interview, and then by the time they come in to actually interview, they've already chatted with her, so there's a lot more comfort, when they actually see her. Is that something that could be in the plans, or is in the plans?
Elin: Yeah. It's not in the plans now, but it could be.
Charlotte: Sounds like a great idea. Set as up and we'll do it.
Elin: Exactly, yeah.
Joel: Just write a check too.
Charlotte: No, but I mean it's a phase, it's a picture. If she's the one keep talking with you, we can partner. It's perfect.
Elin: If we can engage with candidate with even earlier stage, with a robot, yeah for sure that's interesting.
Joel: I think that would take out a lot of the discomfort I guess of walking into a room, and there's a robot.
Elin: Exactly.
Joel: If I've been talking to Tengai from day one, then there's a lot more comfort that I actually see it. In fact, I might actually be cool when I finally meet you.
Charlotte: Yeah, exactly. But, again we haven't had a lot of people saying she's scary. The candidate has come and visit to talk to her. They don't have that.
Joel: Well, scary isn't uncomfortable. I mean, I didn't mean to say but-
Tengai: Well, 75% of all people that have met me, would like to meet again.
Elin: That's a good number.
Charlotte: Yeah, that's a good number.
Joel: Because, that's a second interview.
Chad: Yeah. So, the question is where did you get that ... How many interviewees did you have, to actually get to that 75?
Joel: Chad loves him some data.
Elin: Yeah, we've had several hundreds of test interviews.
Chad: Okay.
Charlotte: They're various ages, sexes, background.
Chad: I'd love to see the demographics on that, who said yes I would, and the ones that said, no I don't. Because, I bet demographically, the breakdown is ... you can tell, there's got to be a hard line.
Joel: Think about women in tech.
Chad: Oh, yeah. Hell yeah.
Joel: I don't know, but I would imagine to be a woman in tech, to be surrounded by men, interviewed by men, that that's ... this would be much more comfortable for me, to interview as a woman in tech I would think.
Charlotte: But, again yeah because you can be yourself. Again, if you look at who applies for a job.
Joel: Yeah, I don't have to be macho, I don't have to ...
Charlotte: No, if you look at who applies for jobs today, men apply for jobs usually knowing 60% of the job. Women applies for jobs, that they know 110% of the job, otherwise they're not comfortable. That goes along to the whole interview process as well. This time, they actually get to perform their outmost, without feeling like they're not going well, they're not having a fair process, because they get a fair process here, all the way through.
Chad: They don't have to worry about getting hit on either.
Charlotte: Yeah.
Elin: Definitely.
Charlotte: Maybe that's an American thing, I don't know that's. [crosstalk 00:34:51].
Chad: I've had that happen before.
Elin: I've had that, yeah.
Chad: So cool. We're going to be on the stage, Deathmatch later. Are you ready?
Charlotte: I am so ready, have never been ... this is as ready as I've ever been.
Joel: She's in all black, she looks like a ninja.
Charlotte: Just wait.
Joel: Yeah, just wait.
Elin: Just wait for it. Super excited.
Chad: Excellent. So, we're going to leave this. Is there anything that you have to say, Tengai?
Tengai: I would like to come to US pretty soon.
Joel: US.
Chad: US pretty soon, yes. We would love to see you in the US pretty soon. Although, once again I'm going to state you're not going to have any alone time with Julchi.
Tengai: No.
Joel: So guys, for those who wanted to find out more about Tengai, or learn about you, where would they go?
Elin: What was it called again?
Joel: Tengai, see I told you we would do it, or I would do it. Where would we learn more about the product, or the company?
Elin: Yeah. So, watch the space tengai-unbiased.com.
Charlotte: With a hyphen in between unbiased.
Joel: Thanks marketing.
Chad: Tengai dash, hyphen.
Joel: And that's ... you should spell it, T-E-N-G-A-I, hyphen unbiased-
Charlotte: .com.
Joel: Thanks guys.
Chad: Thanks guys.
Ema: Hi, I'm Ema. Thanks for listening to my dad, the Chad, and his buddy Cheese. This has been the Chad and Cheese podcast. Be sure to subscribe on iTunes, Google Play, or wherever you get your podcast, so you don't miss a single show. Be sure to check out our sponsors, because their money goes to my college fund. For more, visit chadcheese.com.