Contec Company Skillit Launches Backed By Building Ventures, MetaProp

Contech company Skillit announced that it has launched into business with a $5.1 million seed round led by Building Ventures and including MetaProp, HOLT Ventures, Great North Ventures, 1Sharpe Ventures and Takeoff Capital.

“The platform is already in the hands of select ENR contractors including industry leader Messer Construction,” a company press release said. “It vets workers with proprietary, trade-specific assessments while collecting hundreds of data points to create the first rich, taxonomized view of skilled construction labor across the entire employee lifecycle. The result is a single platform for sourcing, skills assessment, hiring, training, evaluation and win-back that meaningfully improves workforce ROI for contractors facing record labor shortages.”

A taxonomized view of skilled construction labor would refer to workers associated with descriptive categories of work over the period they are employed or contracted by a company. That could in theory include types of tools and techniques someone is familiar with and the general categories of work in which they have experience. As an example, someone might have done roofing and siding but not windows, or the person might have done framing but not finish carpentry.

That should help a hiring entity understand what ranges of skills someone has and how they might fit into the specific needs of the employer at any given time.

“Deskless workers make up 80 percent of the global workforce,” said Skillit CEO and founder Fraser Patterson, who has worked as a carpenter and general contractor. “In construction they are the foundation of the built world and make the $1.6T in annual construction spending happen. Yet we know almost nothing about them because there have been very few purpose-built solutions that meet the needs of both skilled workers and hiring managers.”

“Trade talent doesn’t want gig work, and they don’t want to be constantly marketing themselves,” Patterson continued. “They want opportunities to be a part of something larger and to grow their skills and their careers. At Skillit, we connect the supply of workers with massive contractor demand and we do it surgically so that builders can hire the right people at the right times.”

In addition to tracking skills and experience, the company can match a contractor with potential workers and can provide “data-driven compensation and labor market insights.”

Apparently there has been some discussion between the company and one multi-craft trade group, The Association of Union Constructors. If Skillit ultimately is to be successful, developing relationships with major trade organizations, and also unions, will be important.