A year after Miami tech boom started, locals meet Silicon Valley firms and hope to get hired
Hundreds gathered at Miami Dade College’s downtown Wolfson campus Thursday afternoon for a technology companies job fair that also brought together the mayors of Miami-Dade and Miami and the presidents of the county’s four major universities and colleges.
The event marked a 12-month capstone of sorts for the Miami-area tech boom that has seen the rise of billion-dollar companies but has left many residents wondering how to get hired by those firms.
It came two days before the one-year anniversary of the tweet that Miami Mayor Francis Suarez credits with kicking off the Miami midisconnects gration. He responded, “How can I help,” to a director of Founders Fund, the influential Silicon Valley venture group. That tweet has since been “liked” more than 5,000 times and retweeted nearly 600 times.
An emotional Suarez walked through the crowd Thursday. In remarks, he said the event would transform the lives of its attendees.
“Income inequality is real,” he said, “and a generational problem — though it’s something we’ve had since the beginning of humanity. But now, here, we have the chance to do something about it. Not through government, not through philanthropy but a third way, through empowerment.”
Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said any
between newto-Miami tech firms and hiring local talent, an issue highlighted in recent weeks by the Miami Herald, would help be erased with the event.
“We’ve got all the talent we need,” she said, “and
now we’re here to make that connection.”
Mike Shebat, co-founder and CEO of Traba, a work and hiring portal with backing from Founders Fund, said he was looking to hire as many as 30 people from the fair for jobs in sales, operations and engineering with salaries starting at $13 an hour. Within the first hour of the event, he had already conducted a successful live interview with a sales candidate.
“We want people who can join as early team members, who can be scrappy,” he said, noting the company had experienced 850% revenue growth since launching this year. “We need to build.”
Israel Rigaud, 29, has mostly worked in car sales but wants to break into tech. Armed with a digital copy of his résumé, Rigaud said his goal was to introduce himself in person to companies as a way of breaking through the barriers that come with applying online, especially for tech roles.
“Most people with jobs in tech either are the best at what they do or knew someone,” he said. “I want people to get a feel for how I speak, my demeanor, how I carry myself.”
It is candidates like Rigaud whom Marco, a tech firm that works with import and export companies, was likely seeking. Gina Macropulos, Marco’s chief of staff, said she was looking to increase technology roles.
“If we find someone with the right attitude and who is keen to build, we would try to make a role for them,” she said. “We don’t want to turn away someone we like.”
The job candidates included Alyson Van Stone, a 41-year-old cybersecurity student at the University of Miami in the middle of a career transition after years in marketing. Van Stone said she moved to Miami two years ago.
“I think the city is moving in a great direction,” she said. “It shows more growth, that there are all these new companies” opening corporate headquarters here.