Category — Uzanto

Slideshare is looking to hire a content manager. This is a full time position based out of our Delhi office. Here’s a brief description for the position:

Role Description:

The person will be responsible for content realted aspects of SlideShare. SlideShare is the world’s largest community for sharing presentations. It has all kind of presentations that one could think of and its has a highly diversified user base- diversified in terms of geography, professional background, psychographics etc. The role would involve (but not be limited to)

1. creating and driving the content strategy for SlideShare
2. taking ownership of application’s content related sections (which constantly needs upgradation)
3. writing and managing our various blogs- the slideshare blog and another very interesting blog that we are soon launching
4. user engagement: we are from a user research background and SlideShare has been at the center of a serendipitous learning for us- the fact that in an agile development environment, heightened interactions with users can supplant conventional usability testing to a large extent. In that sense, we look upon user feedback & support as a strategic function. Proof of this lies in the fact that till now the job of answering support emails and user feedbacks (something that is usually accorded less importance) has been done directly by SlideShare’s three founders. Unfortunately we have limited time, but we feel the need for a smart, mature individual to take over that role.
5. handle content related aspects of events, contests, promotions on slideshare
6. represent & evangelize SlideShare in the community, media events..

Desired candidate profile:

1. the candidate must “get web 2.0″; he/she will should be living/breathing the web 24 hours/ day
2. “do what it takes” attitude with regards to work
3. be prepared to work in a small but fast growing, global scale internet company
4. ability to work alongside a hyper-agile software development team (bordering on extreme programming)
5. excellent written & oral language skills
6. prefer somebody with a strong interest/inclination in blogging, new media, social media etc (people authoring a popular blog are at an advantage here)
7. educational background: we’re not hung up about education, so this could be anything, though a degree in mass communication, new media, design etc might help.
8. experience: not more than 3-4 years, candidates with zilch experience are also welcome

Compensation will not be a constraint for the right person. If interested, please ping amit@uzanto.com

Guy Kawasaki’s firm, Garage Ventures and SlideShare have jointly co-sponsored the “Worlds Best Presentation Contest”. The contest went live yesterday and it will continue for a month. The contest’s four judges are literally a who’s who from the world of presentations and communication. Guy Kawasaki needs no introduction, but what you might not know about him is that, he is a thought leader on how to make effective presentations with his 10/20/30 rule. He blogged about the contest here. Garr Reynolds is the author of Presentation Zen and a hugely inspiring figure on the presentation scene. Bert Decker is a very well respected communications expert and is known best for his commentaries on US Presidential debates on television. Jerry Weissman is one of the world’s top presentation coaches and works with many high profile CEOs and companies.

Users will vote on the contest entries and the top entries will be judged by the panel for the Best Presentation Awards. There is also the People’s Choice awards for the entries receiving the most user votes. The prizes for the Best Presentation Award (Alienware laptop, X Box) are sponsored by Microsoft. The People’s Awards prizes (Ipods) are sponsored by SlideShare. If you have a killer slide deck, do enter it into the contest (in fact, you can enter upto five) and get it reviewed by these luminaries of the presentation world. You can learn more about the rules here.

The idea behind the contest is to shine a spotlight on well-designed presentations and to highlight the creative and effective use of PowerPoint. Powerpoints are often blamed for brain dead presentations, but the software is hardly to blame. As Guy Kawasaki says in the press release – “A craftsman doesn’t blame his tools. We expect this contest to show exactly what PowerPoint ‘artists’ can be do with clear thinking, concise text, and cool graphics.”

And here’s some insider news. While we always had a SlideShare contest in the back of our minds, the idea for this one was thought of by Guy Kawasaki himself. He has been involved in the working out of the basic concept and its modalities. Its been a very learning experience for us all along the way.

p.s. - YouTube also launched their 2006 Most Popular Videos Awards yesterday. It was sheer coincidence that the day they chose was the same as ours.

Uzanto is hiring web developers to join our Delhi based team. The job involves working on both our products- SlideShare & MindCanvas. We are a small (but growing) team, which means that if selected, you will get a first-hand experience in the design, development, running, scalability and stabilization of innovative, global scale web products.

Technologies (or platforms) involved are Ruby on Rails (ROR), AJAX, JAVA, PHP, MYSQL, XML, HTML, CSS, Amazon Web Services (like S3 & EC2), Linux, FreeBSD et al. Its great if you have prior experience in these, but that’s not necessary. We are happy to teach you, if you ‘get’ the web and want to make this your career.

We care about bright & enthusiastic folks, with zeal to explore and learn the latest technologies. People who have demonstrated the ability to undertake innovative, independent projects & assignments (outside the purview of their academic or professional work) are preferred. We specially care for people with interest in open source technologies.

Preferred candidate profile - BE/BTech in Computer Science; 0-3 years of web development experience; bright freshers are welcome; people with special interest in Web2.0, blogs, RSS et al are welcome.

We offer attractive salary, a work environment that is geared towards shared learning and the opportunity to play a significant role in creating/running world class web products .

If the above positions interest you, ping me at amit@uzanto.com

The Uzanto/SlideShare geek party (openhouse) turned out to be a fun evening. We had 21-22 participants- a BIG THANKS to all for making it to the party. It was great interfacing with some amongst Delhi’s tech, startup & usability community. We have a small office but when tech enthusiasts meet, any space seems too big. Foods & beverages took a backseat as people were too engrossed in socializing.

Here’s hoping to more of such events in Delhi. The snapshots of the event are shared via slideshare.

Its one of the rare occassions when the entire Uzanto/Slideshare team is together. This is an open invitation to all to come and join us for an informal openhouse on the 1st of Dec (time-6-9 p.m.) at our modest office premises in Green Park. On the agenda for the evening are snacks, gossip, socializing, geek-talk, startup-cribs and all other things of that ilk. Students, fellow entrepreneurs, usability folks, designers, developers- all are welcome. The idea is to meet in an informal setting on a Friday evening and network. And its planned at the end of the week, so that its easy for people to drop by.

Just add your name to this wiki, so that we can budget for space, chairs and off course, food.