Can you tell us about what Kira does?
At Kira systems, we’ve developed software using AI and machine learning to help business professionals do document analysis faster. It’s like the ultimate productivity tool that helps lawyers and other business professionals, reduce costs, increase the quality of work, reduce the amount of time that they’re doing things and just really giving them their life back.
When you’re hiring for some roles here, what are some things you specifically look for?
It’s very different for each role. We’re looking for requirements that would be transferable. So if we’re looking at early career roles, there’s a number of them at most startups. Typically they have coordinator in the title on the operations side of things. On the non-technical business side, we have business development reps, as well as a client support associates. On the technical side, software developer and QA specialists, usually can get a role straight out of school. They have the technical requirements to do those things. Going back to speaking about business development reps, and client support associates – the kind of thing that we’re really looking for is customer orientation. People that have worked in retail, tend to be very successful in the client support role. In fact, a couple of people on our team have been baristas at Starbucks.
How does your interview process look like at Kira Systems?
When you think about the interview process, it starts in a pretty standard way. Most people don’t realize this, but your resume is still the most important document you have when it comes to finding a job. We do our resume screen, and if we like what we see on your resume we will do an initial phone screen with the talent acquisition team. At Kira Systems we evaluate candidates in three areas throughout the rest of the process. The first is technical expertise. The second is team fit. The third is Values fit. On the technical expertise side, every single person that has joined Kira Systems has done a role related practical test. Developers have a coding assignment. Even on my team, the talent acquisition team, they had to do a talent acquisition assignment. There’s nobody that’s joined Kiras Systems that hasn’t done a test. From there, if the test and technical evaluation are good we then do a team fit evaluation. We see how you fit and collaborate with others on your team, and that’s done with people within your business unit. So on the technology team, if you were interviewing as a developer, you might meet somebody from DevOps or a sysadmin or quality engineering. Then we do a Values fit.
So what does that mean? If you and I share the same values, Eric, there’s no reason why we can’t get along – doesn’t matter what part of the world we’re in. You know, we’re just looking for great people. We don’t hire for culture here. Because we feel if you hire for culture there’s a tendency for people to hire the same kinds of people. And so those are the things that we’re focusing on, Values being very important to us. And so when you’re in the values interview, if you’re a developer, you might meet with somebody from marketing and sales, simply because we feel values are universal throughout the organization. And so that’s really how we evaluate our candidates here. It has helped us establish at Kira diversity of thought, diversity of expertise, and really made this a wonderful place to work.
What’s it like to work here?
I’m a little bit biased and I think that this is probably one of the best places to work in Toronto, if not Canada. We have a super fun group of individuals, we have a social committee that makes a calendar for the month. So this month we’re doing things like pumpkin carving, a family excursion to screamers. And we’re doing like movie nights, because we realized that you spend a lot of time with your colleagues, why not have a little bit of fun doing it. Other perks include flexible vacation. Basically, it’s unlimited. Use it, don’t abuse it. But we have a policy that you take a minimum of three weeks of vacation period. If you do more than that. That’s okay. We have a flexible work environment. Eric, as you can see in our eyes is there’s a lot of desks, but there’s a lot of empty seats. It’s because people can work from home. So you don’t have to be in the office every day. And there’s a lot of different perks, like we just implemented an RSP program. So if you’ve been with the company for a year, you’re eligible for that. We’re continuing to grow. We have founders that care about all their employees, and are still giving a bit of equity to new employees at this point in time.
How about what kind of roles are you looking to hire like currently or in the future?
We’ll always be looking for people on the sales side of the business, as well as on the technical side: developers and QA. We’ll be looking for designers, we’re going to be looking for people across the board. So if you go to the Kira careers web page at https://kirasystems.com/careers/, you’ll find a whole host of roles that we’re hiring for. And like I said the early career type of roles are client support associate, Business Development Rep. Obviously, on the technical side, software developer and QA specialist. But you know, we’re open to having people from different walks of life. We just hired a graphic designer, but we’ll probably be expanding that team. You know, we’re looking to grow up by about 25% in the coming months.
What other advice do you have for candidates out there that are exploring new opportunities?
Your resume is still one of the most important documents that you have. Just highlight how you might be able to add value or contribute to the organization. Reach out to members of the organization and have coffee with them. Really build your network. They may not be hiring at that time, but will be later down the road or they know people within the industry that are always going to be looking to build their teams. So my recommendation is try to share a resume that has relevant skills and shows that you’ll be able to add value and meet as many people as possible. Here at Kira Systems feel free to reach out to any member of the talent acquisition team.
For our audience that want to learn more about Kira System where can they learn more?
Best place like I mentioned before, is our website: https://kirasystems.com/careers/. That will tell you what our software actually does. There’s videos on there, infographics, white papers and then to know more about our careers.