Bandana is a company that empowers hourly and entry-level workers and gives them the tools they need to transform their lives for the better — starting with finding a better, higher-paying job. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Bandana co-founder and CEO Tim Makalinao to learn more about the company.
Tim Makalinao’s Background
Could you tell me more about your background? Makalinao said:
“I was 6 when my family came to America from the Philippines to build a better life. We settled in New Jersey and my mom went to work in a factory earning $12 an hour, supporting a family of four. That employer treated her poorly because they knew our family wanted to build a life in America.”
“My dad was a mechanical engineer in the Philippines and he took care of us while my mom was at work – an unconventional arrangement at the time. Our family struggled to make ends meet. We slept in my aunt’s basement until we got on our feet. My brother and I were on the reduced lunch program, and our family lived without healthcare for years.”
“After I graduated from Harvard, which is where I met my co-founders, we worked in finance and tech for several years. I wanted to establish a financial net for myself. I helped pay for my brother’s Paolo’s college tuition at Stanford. Then, when I felt like I was financially stable, I decided to start Bandana to give others the tools to help build better lives, starting with finding a better, higher-paying job. There’s no one I would rather start a company with than my co-founders and talented friends Caleb Lee and Larry Zhang whose families emigrated from Korea and China respectively. They immediately understood the need to build this company. They left their jobs, and we began working on the businesses together.”
Formation Of The Company
How did the idea for the company come together? Makalinao shared:
“Bandana’s mission is to improve the livelihoods of hourly and entry-level workers and bring transparency and trust back to the job search. I knew I wanted to build a mission-driven company so people could have the opportunities and resources that my mom didn’t have.”
Favorite Memory
What has been your favorite memory working for the company so far? Makalinao reflected:
“What is the most gratifying is hearing directly from the people we’ve helped.”
Core Products
What are the company’s core products and features? Makalinao explained:
“At Bandana, we exist to give back hard-working Americans the power to transform their lives for the better. Bandana is a job search engine for hourly and entry level workers built on transparency and trust. All jobs on our website are $17 and up and all full-time jobs have healthcare benefits. You can search for jobs by take-home pay after taxes so you can see what you’re actually bringing home.”
“Not only do we offer job search, but we offer resources people need to succeed, such as:
- A resume tool that creates and optimizes one’s resume in minutes
- “Compare my Pay tool” which uses recent salary data to ensure people are being paid fairly
- Specific questions top companies like Tiffany & Co., Starbucks and REI ask in interviews so candidates can go in informed
- A job tracker to keep people organized and so much more”
Challenges Faced
Have you faced any challenges in your sector of work recently? Makalinao acknowledged:
“Helping people find good jobs is hard. Job seekers are incredibly unique. They face a range of challenges that are incredibly personal and varied – from age, to language, to family obligations, to disabilities, to being justice impacted. We love that Bandana users are so diverse, but we can’t build the perfect job search experience for everyone. We get so many requests for language filters (jobs that don’t require English), and many other things like filters for jobs that support justice-impacted individuals.”
“We’ve realized that we can’t build out every single request for everyone. Instead, we’ve partnered with incredible organizations across cities who serve their communities best. We’ve created community tools and guides so that local workforce development organizations can help their job seekers use Bandana in ways that make the most sense for them. Partners can access all our workshop materials at: bandana.com/b/toolkit, and find all community resources at: resources.bandana.com.”
Evolution Of The Company’s Technology
How has the company’s technology evolved since launching? Makalinao noted:
“We started out as a job search platform, and we are evolving to become the single place job seekers can turn to do everything related to job search. They can find the top jobs on Bandana, build ready-to-use resumes, and manage and track their job applications. We’ve built integrations with top applicant tracking systems like Greenhouse and Lever, so job seekers can directly submit their profiles to companies on Bandana – this way, applicants can also track the status of their applications directly on Bandana. And there’s so much more that we’d like to do. We want to help workers build better livelihoods, an ambitious goal, we know, but we have already begun introducing new features to achieve that goal.”
Significant Milestones
What have been some of the company’s most significant milestones? Makalinao cited:
“It was always our intention to deliver tools that go beyond job search. This tax season, we’ve partnered Column Tax to offer individuals across the U.S. the ability to file their state and federal taxes for free directly through Bandana’s web and mobile platforms. With this collaboration people can do their taxes in 15 minutes or less for no charge! We hope that this helps people feel empowered and supported on their journeys to build better livelihoods for themselves and their families.”
Customer Success Stories
Can you share any specific customer success stories? Makalinao highlighted:
“There are so many amazing stories to share. We work with a lot of community organizations to host job fairs, and one day at a job fair in New York City, a man came up to talk with me and he said, ‘Tim, I’m not here to find a job, I’m just here to tell you that I landed a job as a bricklayer through Bandana. I now have a union job with good pay, benefits and a promising career. I am very grateful for Bandana and what you guys do and stand for.’ Stories like that remind us that we’re on the right path.”
Funding
When asking Makalinao about the company’s funding details, he revealed:
“Bandana has received $12.3 million in funding including an infusion of $8.5 million from General Catalyst, Craft Ventures and Triple Impact Capital.”
Differentiation From The Competition
What differentiates the company from its competition? Makalinao affirmed:
“Bandana is different from other job search platforms in many ways.”
“First, Bandana is built for the worker. We focus on helping hourly and entry-level workers find higher-paying jobs through trust and transparency.”
“Job search is broken where many job search sites only accept sponsored job posts to the exclusion of others so job seekers don’t even know that other jobs exist at a particular company because only the sponsored jobs are listed. It is a pay to play model. However, Bandana lists all jobs so job seekers can see all of the open jobs at that company. Since jobs link directly to the employer’s site, job seekers find jobs quicker and easier.”
“Second, we feature all jobs on our platform on a map so that people can see where roles are located and calculate their commute time. Our platform is built more like Streeteasy and Zillow than traditional job platforms and that’s intentional. You wouldn’t rent an apartment without knowing where it was located so why would you do that for a job? If you can find a higher paying job closer to home, why wouldn’t you apply for it? We make that easier than ever.”
Future Company Goals
What are some of the company’s future goals? Makalinao concluded:
“We’re excited to continue to expand to additional markets in the U.S. and build tools and resources workers need to succeed.”
“We’re proud that Bandana launched a little over a year ago and is the fastest growing job website. We’ve helped over 1 million people search for jobs and 40,000 find jobs. We operate in Illinois, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island and California and are just getting started!”
