Insider Only Techopia, Top Stories

Hire expectations: Ex-Shopify staffer’s new startup uses AI to take legwork out of recruiting

October 7, 2024

Already an Insider? Log in

Get Instant Access to This Article

Become an Ottawa Business Journal Insider and get immediate access to all of our Insider-only content and much more.

A former Shopify employee and senior executive at one of Ottawa’s leading software startups is taking the lessons she learned at those tech trailblazers and applying them to a new enterprise of her own – an AI-powered “lead-generation tool” for recruiters and hiring managers. Danika Chilibeck launched her new company, Bahia AI, with friend and business partner Delaney Thompson in June. More than a dozen customers have since signed on to the platform, which uses artificial intelligence to mine resources such as LinkedIn and private online job communities in an effort to connect candidates with employers. Chilibeck and Thompson hatched the idea earlier this spring when both were working remotely from Puerto Vallarta, Mexico – Chilibeck as director of operations for Ottawa software maker Rewind and Thompson in sales for a small company based in Germany. (They named their venture Bahia, which is Spanish for “bay,” in a nod to the Mexican resort’s location on the Pacific Ocean’s Bahia de Banderas.) The pair of Canadian expats, who met through a shared passion for outdoor volleyball, noticed they were fielding a lot of questions about remote work from others who were interested in ditching the office for a more nomadic lifestyle. Their initial response was to create a free community-based platform with resources for people looking to work remotely, a site which launched in January. Within a few months, the concept had morphed into a way for employers to find workers, wherever they might be. For Chilibeck, the new venture was an idea whose time had come. Not only was she in the midst of trying to fill multiple job openings at Rewind, she also happened to be in charge of an employee competition to brainstorm ways of using artificial intelligence to make the company more efficient. Soon enough, Bahia was born. “When I got involved a little more deeply, I realized, ‘Wow. This process of hiring people is really stressful and very time-consuming.’ And it’s expensive if you start relying on agencies,” Chilibeck explained. To test the waters, Chilibeck and Thompson emailed more than 200 recruiters at the end of May to gauge their interest in the concept. “We were really ultimately just trying to find ways to match both the candidate and the company together,” Chilibeck said. “We’re kind of like work matchmakers.” Encouraged by the feedback they received, the founders quickly hired a development firm to create an AI agent that takes hiring criteria provided by HR managers and scours online job resources to compile and screen a list of ideal candidates. Potential hires are then alerted to the job opening. Those who wish to be considered for the position are entered in a pool of candidates, and hiring managers select a short list from there. The platform automatically schedules the job interviews. The three-person enterprise – which charges a fixed fee for each job to be filled and also offers a 12-month subscription package – has been entirely customer-funded since its inception four months ago. Already profitable, its list of clients includes rising local tech firms such as Fellow, Fullscript and Iversoft. Chilibeck, who still works part-time at Rewind, says the young company has no current plans to seek outside financing as it looks to build on its early momentum. “We’re not fully closing the door on that, but for now there’s no need,” said the University of Ottawa finance alumna, who began her business career in Welch Capital Partners’ mergers and acquisitions department in 2015 before spending three years as a financial analyst at Shopify. In 2021, Chilibeck joined Rewind, where she initially served as a manager in the data-backup software firm’s financial planning and analysis department before moving into operations. Rewind has been one of Ottawa’s biggest tech success stories of the past half-decade, thanks in no small part to the leadership of CEO and co-founder Mike Potter. Chilibeck calls her longtime boss an “amazing” mentor who’s allowed her the leeway to continue working for Rewind part-time while getting her own entrepreneurial venture off the ground. “I’m so thankful for that, because it just allowed me to work on the business (while mitigating) a lot of that risk,” she said. “It’s definitely helped me sleep better at night knowing that I can still do both.” The way Chilibeck describes it, working with Potter has been like taking a crash course in entrepreneurship. “I’ve learned so much about business from him,” she said. “He’s just really good at cutting out the BS and just focusing on what matters most and being super customer-focused.” Chilibeck hopes Bahia’s early success can show aspiring founders they don’t need to break the bank to build a viable startup. “There’s a way you can go about starting a business that doesn’t require you to fully quit your job and not make money for years.”