“MyTransform aims to align education with career choices”: CEO Roopali Mehra

It’s never too early for a student to begin preparing for the career they will pursue after graduation. In fact, it’s best to start as early as possible. Most of the time, students enrol in a course due to parental pressure or a lack of awareness of their career options. This could be one of the reasons behind increasing unemployment. In conversation with CXOToday, Roopali Mehra, founder and CEO of MyTransform, said that the transition from school to work requires informed decision making by young adults in their careers. Lack of information-based decisions leads to mismatch between youth skills/qualifications and job requirements.

What was the cause behind this initiative? 

The life of a student is not just about studying and preparing for the future, it primarily focuses on making a well-informed career choice. If proper support and guidance is not provided at the right time, it can diminish the chances of a student choosing the right path. This led to the beginning of Transform Foundation. It was founded to provide the right guidance to the youth and put forward the career pathways they can choose from.

We provide a standardized assessment platform that helps students to understand their strengths and interests. Based on the test outcome, the platform share various career clusters accordingly. Based on his selections, the student sees various career options.

We aim to bridge the gap between existing job opportunities and the skilled youth with the help of infrastructural development and employment generation.

How is MyTransform different from career-counselling apps? 

MyTransform is an app-based platform that addresses the contemporary issues of youth transitioning from learning to work. Through this app, youth will also be able to create their aspirational profile and connect with other like-minded people, forming a unique cohort for knowledge sharing on careers. Creating a strong profile and summarise your skills, interest, certifications and passion for the employers is one of key milestones in the journey. The platform helps them in creating a strong profile as well.

Transform Foundation has created a unique ‘Transition Management Model’ to map all the stages and activities involved in the transition process. The model offers a flexible format and a customizable approach for youth at any stage of the transition from learning to work. Inter-related tasks of transition are arranged in a systematic series, with clearly defined inputs and outputs, creating value at each step.

MyTransform offers a platform for Career Assessment, Goal Setting, Resume Building, Career-Related Networking.

How MyTransform app is helping in creating awareness?

The app provides students with an assessment needed to help them align their interests with the correct knowledge about the relevant career pathways. With the help of AI, it fetches the technological information into the system, assesses and curates a profile for them.

Using AI, the platform will provide the students with various provisions such as:

1) Students will be able to assess their self-awareness using a RIASEC assessment.
2) They would be made aware of the world of work through clusters, pathways, and occupations. It will also assist students in their career goal setting by allowing them to explore the opportunities and identify those that match their personalities after a shortlisting and finalising process.

3) The platform will help them build a connection with like-minded students, where one can connect with other students with similar personality traits or career choices.
4) It will also help in profile building, where one can build a resume and share the same.

5) It also shows personalised content/ feed, news, hiring companies and clusters based on the user’s interests.

What is MyTransform’s USP?

Our goal is to align education with the career choices. Our USP is that the app enables youth to create an impressive profile that captures their education, skills, experience (in job or as a freelancer), soft skills, and more. The profiles are downloadable and shareable as a resume/CV to avail opportunities in further skilling, education, or employment. The app also enables youth to use their profiles on the app to network with other like-minded youth for peer-to-peer mentoring.

The app helps youth stay informed about ever-evolving opportunities in careers and skills, connect with peers, share credentials with employers, skill providers, and educators, and also convey their aspirations and goals to their governments through dashboards and analytics.

The process encourages work exposure not only to gain insights into desired job options and make an informed decision, but also to develop interests and awareness in other, lesser-known areas of work.

Have you worked with governments? What was the nature of the work that was undertaken, and what were the outputs? How has this collaboration benefited the government?

MyTransform is certified by the Education Alliance, Finland, and is a part of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). In 2021, MyTransform was adopted by the Government of Jammu and Kashmir, where it benefited over 30,000 youth. We implemented a one-of-a-kind initiative for students in the Jammu and Kashmir districts of Ganderbal and Udhampur to provide early career education guidance.

In the past, we have signed an MoU with the Government of Haryana and Uttarakhand.

Recently, at the Global Investors Summit 2023, we signed an MOU with the Uttar Pradesh Skill Development Mission (UPSDM). Transform Foundation will provide access to the MyTransform mobile app to youth in the 14–35 age group. The MyTransform mobile app will consist of features and functionalities that will enable youth to explore different fields of work and career options. The app will also enable youth to make selections to mark their preferences and eventually select a career-goal.

The app also enables the government to make informed decisions. The data could be used by the government to assess the supply side of talent and drive investment in skill development, education, and job opportunities for youth.