Your face on the résumé

If your job résumé needs a makeover, iDisk may just be the solution.

Do you think a text biodata is way too impersonal? And that, if there was a way to show your face to prospective employers and tell them about yourself, you would improve your chances of landing a job or getting a better one?

If the answer to those questions is "yes", then iDisk, the new audio-visual CV developed by the Kolkata-based Futuresoft Manmanagement, could be just for you.

Of course, iDisk was not developed merely for the benefit of personable job-seekers. Rather, it resulted from the need -- perceived by Futuresoft during its interactions with employers -- to place students at its institutes.

"We found that the HR executives of many companies insisted on seeing the candidates for themselves," says Ayan Chatterjee, CEO, Futuresoft.

"Even a telephone interview did not help. And video-conferencing does not come cheap. Often, candidates lost out because they could not travel."

The iDisk is a simple solution to the problem, but it is also the fruit of cutting-edge research by Aniruddha Singhania and his team at Softnet Solutions to compress the 80-100 MB raw footage into a 500 KB file. Little wonder then that Futuresoft has filed for a patent on the iDisk.

"The quality drop of 10 per cent is negligible," says Chatterjee. Given broadband, it would mean a download time of 10-15 seconds. For end-users, that would be a real help since besides a CD of the CV, Futuresoft also provides a URL link, which can be appended to a text resume.

As of now, Futuresoft has two Video Resume Centres in Kolkata -- soundproof rooms equipped with a camera and a screen for a backdrop. There are professional trainers who will guide your performance and lend you a formal shirt and tie, and even a powder-girl to touch up your face. Editing is done at a central lab.

Chatterjee claims to have put in just Rs 10 lakh (Rs 1 million) so far in the entire project, marketing and advertising costs not included.

But, says Chatterjee, Futuresoft has no plans to aggressively promote the new product. Even publicity within Calcutta is limited to hoardings. There has been a lot of interest in the product, going by the 700-800 calls that Futuresoft claims to be receiving every day at its two centres -- but until now it has been able to build a database of just 10 iDisks.

The stumbling block could be the price tag of Rs 990 -- or, as Chatterjee says, the conservativeness of the general Kolkatan. Or the lack of interest among employers. As Samrat Sarkar of Manpower Consultants puts it, "There has been no demand for audio-visual CVs from our clients."

So Futuresoft has turned its sights beyond Kolkata. By March next year, the company will take the iDisk to Pune, and to Gurgaon by September 2006.

But there are no plans to tie up with any of the established big-ticket job portals. Instead, Futuresoft will post iDisk on its own job-portal that is being set up to tap the bi-lingual jobs market. But the face, in any language, will remain the same.