Craftsman shortage: Start-up PowerUs places skilled workers with craft businesses and corporations

Craftsmen are in high demand. Skilled workers from the electrical sector in particular are urgently needed so that companies can successfully master the energy transition. The start-up PowerUs has recognized this need at the right time and offers a platform on which electricians and plant mechanics as well as skilled trades companies, SMEs from the energy sector and large corporations can easily find each other. Over 80,000 tradespeople and 1,000 companies from Germany now have their own profiles on PowerUs. We spoke to co-founder Konrad Geiger about this clever solution and the current cooperation between PowerUs and Service4Charger.

The founders of PowerUs: Julian Lindinger and Konrad Geiger

Konrad, you recently raised 20 million euros in a financing round. Many tradespeople and companies are already represented with you. What is behind the success of PowerUs?

The energy transition in particular means that there are endless orders in the electrical sector. But many companies lack the skilled workers to take them on. We offer a solution that is both highly specific and comprehensive. We only show tradespeople jobs that are really relevant to them. We provide companies with a practical system that allows them to manage the entire recruitment process on one platform, from job advertisement to hiring. We also provide advice and help companies to make individual steps, such as creating a company profile, attractive and effective.

Which channels do you use to reach tradespeople in particular?

That is very different. Tradespeople are often on the move. We have found that WhatsApp is a communication channel that they like to use. In general, we do a lot of advertising on social media, but we also use traditional channels such as advertising posters. That’s why all generations of tradespeople are represented here. In the meantime, of course, a lot is done via recommendations.

Around 1000 companies from Germany alone are already working with you. How does the cooperation process work?

All companies receive personal support from us. We help the companies to present themselves and their jobs as attractively as possible on our platform. There is the option of simply publishing a profile and job advertisements or using PowerUs free of charge for the entire recruitment process.

Companies that take advantage of this opportunity can get advice from us every step of the way. We not only see whether the job advertisements are optimally formulated. We can also help if, for example, we determine from the data that a skilled trades company needs too much time from the interview to acceptance and is therefore losing out on ideal candidates.

Can you tell us a bit more about one of your collaborations?

Yes, with pleasure! Service4Charger is one of the companies we’ve been working with for a while now. The company offers an all-round service for the charging infrastructure of electric vehicles. We got to know each other in 2021. Managing Director Lucas Althammer had heard about us at the time and approached us.

What were the particular challenges of your cooperation project?

Service4Charger was already very well positioned in terms of self-presentation. The main challenge here was that the company had to grow very quickly. In some cases, 20 new people had to be hired each quarter. On the one hand, we had to reach these specialists. On the other hand, the whole recruiting process could not take long.

Did you manage that?

Yes, Service4Charger offers attractive positions, especially for tradespeople who are particularly enthusiastic about e-mobility and prefer to specialize rather than work as all-rounders. The company is now one of our regular cooperation partners and personal contact has also intensified. If we want to test new features on our platform, we ask Lucas and his team for feedback.

What do you recommend to companies that are still unsure whether they want to cooperate with you?

Just try it out! Not finding suitable skilled workers can be a real obstacle to growth for companies. Our platform is not very cost-intensive for companies. So it’s worth taking the opportunity.

What’s next for PowerUs? Skilled workers are also needed in many other trades …

We have actually done well so far by specializing in electricians. However, we are planning to expand our platform to mechanics and mechatronics engineers in the medium term. In the long term, we would also like to gain a foothold in other European countries.

Contact us

Website: PowerUs

LinkedIn: Konrad Geiger