The 2020 Forbes 30 Under 30 Enterprise Technology honorees were just announced and our brilliant Co-founder & CTO, Aram Shatakhtsyan, made the list.
“While they’re [all] tackling a wide range of problems—like simplifying human resources or making the gig economy work better for everyone—the one thing these stars all have in common is that they’re bold and ambitious entrepreneurs.”
Aram’s journey to becoming an entrepreneur and building CodeSignal started in Armenia.
He first decided to learn to code thanks to his father, who was a programmer himself. From there, Aram realized that he loved solving complex problems. He went on to win numerous awards at prestigious programming competitions such as Armenia’s National Informatics Olympiad and ACM ICPC (International Collegiate Programming Contest).
When he turned 18, he was accepted into Yerevan State University, a leading university in Armenia but relatively unknown to the larger landscape. Because he had already been coding for over five years and had won distinguished competitions, he started applying to software engineering positions his freshman year. He had no luck. Even though he had the skills, he didn’t have the “right” resume.
After three years, a company finally took a chance on Aram and gave him his first engineering internship. He soon graduated and found a passion for solving hard technical problems for various companies and dove headfirst into freelancing as a software engineer.
That is how he connected with Tigran Sloyan, CEO and co-founder of CodeSignal. “Aram is an inspirational example of why the world needs to #GoBeyondResumes! If you looked at his resume 5 years ago, you wouldn’t have thought much of it because there wasn’t a fancy school or employer name on it. The level of technical prowess he possesses would have been overlooked. Luckily I had the opportunity to work with him on a project and was able to confirm his brilliance and competence. So, when I decided to start a company I asked him to join me on the journey,” said Tigran.
Having experienced the incredibly inefficient state of the current job market which lacks a clear signal for one’s talent and capability that both employers and job candidates can rely on, Aram became committed to enabling companies to identify talent beyond resumes by measuring candidates’ skills directly.
“I could tell that if there was a way to really assess your skills, your resume wouldn’t matter. Engineers wouldn’t have to waste time on making their resume look good or having something notable in there that doesn’t actually reflect their skills,” stated Aram when discussing the #GoBeyondResume movement.
When asked about how he felt about being honored on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list, Aram stated, “I didn’t even know what Forbes 30 Under 30 was until this year. I had no idea how prestigious of an opportunity it is and how it truly honors the entrepreneur’s journey. Now, I feel so honored to be a part of it – not just for myself – but on behalf of the entire CodeSignal team. I’m forever grateful.”