Digonto

Digonto is a startup aimed to keep track of students' progress and certificates/achievements as young as kindergarten stepping all the way to college and employment beyond. The problem we are addressing is lack of job placement and to do that we are going from the root by providing a platform that ensures reliable financial stability from young into adulthood. We are a certified platform that is linked with educational institutions, online education, teachers, students, alumnus, mentors, and employment companies that are within our network. We ensure jobs being applied are verified candidates with job skills approved legitimacy with badge after approval from instructors themselves. Providing this framework, our solution will drastically improve the livelihood of Bangladesh and provide the individual to transition into their career of choice while also allowing companies with perfect candidates not just from their skill set but have certainty that it's coming from a reliable source.

The problem in which I am trying to address is to reduce the unemployment rate in Bangladesh. According to Statista and CEIC, Bangladesh unemployment rate currently at 4.31% spiking at 5% in 2009 at its relative highest. It is unfortunate to know that as of December 1991 one of the lowest rates of unemployment was marked at 2.20%. With this statistic, we can assume Bangladesh job unemployment market has declined more than double in percentage. As the population grows reported 165.55 million as of June 2019 it is important that the labor force participation rate has increased to approximately 60%. With all this in mind, the some of the main reasons why unemployment rates have increased due to the lack of technological changes, fewer women in labor force, declining economic conditions, and the difficulty in production of electricity for Bangladesh. In order to combat that our platform will utilize the existing technological structures on mobile to communicate with academic institutions.

Bangladesh population has been reported 165.55 million people as of June 2019 this ever growing will only increase and it's is big factor that among this we can meet the demand of jobs and match with appropriate employment demands and opportunities. Our platform is working with existing instructions and educators and instructers along with company management such as HR to ensure unemployment rate of 4.31% can be reduced. We are working with relevant companies to ensure the education sector is able to sustain the market share by providing with the in demand skills that can be directly applied into the transition of the job. With our platform we hope to allow students to become not only certified in their domain we want to ensure they are verified and up to date in their skills that can be shown off to market and companies can get straight and streamline the hiring process.

Our solution will help by providing an avenue in which every certificate or outstanding achievement will be kept tracked within the app, which is then verified by the issuer. Example including if a student received a certificate or award of excellence for a time in the academic institution it's verified by the school or specified instructor and then this goes through our approved credibility check where we issue a badge the provides assurity for future company to visit. Over time as the applicant updates relevant job experience and additional certificates along with real world projects and the skills sets that have been added we will ensure that these skills are verified by checking with other platforms include online portfolio links, Github or even the  certificate provider as necessary in some instance involve relevant company to confirm the legitimacy of these relevant information. Once approval is complete we can both notify applicant of relevant companies that match the user's skills and have them reach with HR or recruiter as necessary to make arrangements. For every company utilizing out services we issue a month to month pricing model to allow the platform to earn revenue and for any job issued in our platform we will take employers 20% of employers 1st month salary as a token for utilizing out network for job placement for 1st job on platform. The process in which we are utilizing is iOS and Android app to build out the system. By creating this system from early education to college and beyond we can streamline the process to job ready and career growth.

Our solution is innovative to its core because it establishes a digital portfolio from the moment the students attend an education institution out to graduation and in the real-world job market. Our main objective is to develop reliable, well established, and certified candidates for the job market to decrease the employment rate in Bangladesh. Not only does it help students improve their transition to employment but also HR or recruiter can find the accurate applicant for their job listing or position. Everyone is unique to their interests and updates along with what they study and achieve. This system can apply in all facets of industries including the medical, technical, business, and industrial level majors. Every student as young as kindergarten may receive a certificate of achievement and with each stage as they advance their grade level is maintained by their institution and instructor provides approval of credibility from what the individual is awarded with. Every form of on-hands training, or capstone project is tracked and recorded to benefit the student essentially creating an extension to their profile and resume so they are ready by the time education is complete.

Theory of Change encompasses four elements that my idea revolves around. For activity we have class training and education development. Followed by the output of being rewarded for student's achievements short term it creates a digital portfolio and long term gives a great first impression to companies and hiring partners, increases visibility and online presence, and create a larger extension to your resume. Another example or perspective where theory of change can be applied with our idea is we create a platform that keeps record of student activities and achievement which translates to having a credited or certified profile to showcase your activities as output and the short term outcome is you have the potential be equipped for job market and long term outcome you work at a quality company with a well paid job. Our mission statement is to establish and prepare any candidate for a career ready position. 

Our startup is at a concept stage in our project development, our initial or current people at this time will be 0. Our prospects moving ahead as we are located in Dhaka we want to start reaching out to local education institutions, communities, and nearby town in the area roughly estimates of 60% percent for which we are aiming toward the long-term plan. Our target audience is teenage and youth individual in education, who are already aiming to work with established university, so our plan can be executed. Of this 60% involvement will be our project planning, 10% of this which will be executed each year resulting in remaining 5-year plan will be performed at a 50% adoption scale in total. The largest public research university we are aiming for student body in Bangladesh is the University of Dhaka which consists of 30,000 plus students and over 1800 in faculty. This is where are initial steps will be targeted to apply our solution.

My solution comes from my student life struggles. Job market is a difficult process and even now I am seeking employment. There are many students like who have potential but are not being recognized or pushed to the extent they can. Institutions stress to build out proper resume, cv, and cover letter, this is the traditional way of seeking employment. There is a better approach for career growth and the gap in this market, I know my solution will make impact by creating an online application that will bridge the gap between academia and industries leaders globally. It's important to be informed and to pursue based on job market demands. I pursued in my education and consistently value being certified which I have done as an Oracle Certified DBA. My goals in the next year is to develop framework for my startup and be exposed to new cloud technologies such as AWS and utilize them in my development to create a solid infrastructure. With enough funding and networking, I want the startup to build out a prototype for college students to use in beta. My personal goals are to become a Cloud Solutions Architect and be well versed in AWS technologies, because that is where demand is for my field in database administration. I know what the online market is capable for Bangladeshi students and with the app they can pursue their field just as I am pursuing through the means of building a digital profile and portfolio.

One barrier that currently exist for me to accomplish my goals for the next year and for the upcoming five years is to raise social awareness on how important the youth is for our generation because they will be running our country, we need to stress how important self-development and career growth is for Bangladesh because unemployment rate as increased to 4.31% this year compared to 1998 when it was at 2.83% according CEIC. We need the right resources to build a framework that won’t collapse and easily be deployed from college to college and must be student and staff driven in a way that is self-sustaining business. Our solution is to create a digital application that works as an umbrella for all institutions to have students develop a public profile with a digital portfolio that can be shown to prospective employees and every part is already approved and verified by the institution and certificate provider. We want to bridge the gap between academia and industry. The second barrier is for our five-year plan is having enough resources to restructure education and having the right developmental projects in place to create an application that will benefit students and institutions and companies both locally and internationally.

Resources I will use to combat is the lack of awareness in youth and employment is through social media, influencers, and networks of successful startups that I have connection will seek mentorship and advice to grow this potential business. I also want to take feedback and input from teenagers and young students who I know and ask what they are doing to prepare themselves for jobs what processes they are currently taking, what they feel is missing in their market, and ask professors or staff on what they are doing to attract companies and what steps they are taking to talk to other industries. I want to adopt and take good examples and create an equal plain field across all students and education level. Fill areas that need more attention and gather enough data to create the app for market and brand awareness, so I can build out a strategy that each student need at scale. According to Dhaka Tribune, one in ten country of 4.4 million youth face unemployment in Bangladesh, but to my astonishment World Vision says 72% of the youth in Bangladesh have interest in receiving vocational training to gain the rightful skills to gain employment. There is clearly a gap and our youth have potential they really need some organization and app in market that will sustain their future. One of the main objectives of going to school is not just to gain knowledge, but to have relevant skills, and apply them in the real world. 

I have chosen hybrid therefore for my organization therefore I will disregard this question at this time.

Currently we are three individuals working to build the solution for our product. We have two part-time engineers and I am working full time with the project management workflow. Our future projects once we can develop a fully-fledged out application in mobile app as a 6 month to 1-year projection plan prototype we will initiate any contractors, if necessary, to finance and polish our product. Expanding our team may be necessary once we can have a successful prototype established for our product and platform.

I come with an Oracle certified DBA, I have experience in PLSQL and also pursuing education in Amazon Web Services to expand my skills in cloud technology. I have a team consisting of two members now, one member is a Cyber Security Specialist and another member who is working as Cloud Systems Engineer using AWS both work for software firms and have extensive knowledge in their field ranging 4 plus years of experience in programming. We are equipped to deliver the solution because this has been a passion project among out team to build. We see a clear need for this solution for the students, academia, and industry leaders in Bangladesh today. If we minimize the unemployment situation and recognize the talented youth individual, we can change the way learn and work on their career growth and development.

We have not yet partnered with any existing organizations as we are trying initially working internally as a team to build out the business work as a nonprofit and work into the transition for profit. We want to ensure our development to minimize cost is handled in house operation and once a prototype is established within my team of three individuals currently we will expand our services out to other university once we receive positive feedback in the University of Dhaka. We are working our developmental projects primarily remotely basis and working with existing college students who have expertise in this domain and I am expanding my networking socially and will plan to email to individuals I know who have startup experience to seek potential mentorship and collaborative initiatives.

My business model begins with our Digonto our first digital based portfolio platform. Our key customers and beneficiaries are hiring partners and incoming college students. Our service is to bridge the gap between academia and industry by providing a service that offers incoming youth that are certified approved leaders in their field and companies have a quick glimpse of what capabilities the applicants have and can be ensured that every skills is traced back, verified, and approved on our platform for assurance. Applicants are matched with the right companies and companies are matched to the right applicants. That is our end result.

Our revenue stream will come for each company that post on our network of platform we establish a month to month subscription model for our hiring partners and companies that post their ad on our job listing. While this is available, we encourage instead of students or applicants have the option to apply in a simple process on our job board because their information and certificates are already gathered from their college database and digital profile. Students are only after being accepted offer that for the first month because we want to ensure growth within this application we will take 20% of revenue of applicant's first month salary and create a network with our infrastructure to create a community building platform online. We want to encourage new students to join our platform and be part of our career expanding network.

Tiger IT Foundation will lift the financial barriers we are projecting within our project planning and it will also allow us to create new opportunities to work with industry partners with your network. Specific to the founding sources outside of operational costs, we can invest in new emerging technologies such as AWS and Flutter app development work with quality level developers to polish our application and we can upscale it quite easily once we have a proven model and the financial backing. Outside of our fixed and variable costs, a lot of our time and funds will go into research and development because we care about the youth, the students, and companies within Bangladesh and globally. Establishing a good network and developing the positive relationships between both parties is crucial to have our product grow. Our objective is to improve and reduce job unemployment and to make lives our educated peers a smooth transition into the career field. We want to encourage self development and take every opportunity to develop each applicant with a profile that makes individual stand out in the market.

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We would like to partner with two strategic organizations moving forward which is Global Partnership for Education because their objective aligns with us in which they are an alliance to improving education for 19 million Bangladeshi children through more than 100,000 kindergartens through primary public schools and schools run by civil society organizations. In addition to UNESCO and UNICEF to help us with grow youth foundation and help them grow to existing education institutions and have a life changing environment.